Redefining Global E-Waste Management: How Can We Learn from Agbogbloshie?

Instructor Introduction

Anneliese's writing sheds light on how western consumption patterns--even those deemed 'sustainable' or 'regenerative'--create enduring patterns of toxic coloniality in the Global South. Using Agbogbloshie, an e-waste recycling site in Ghana, as a case study, Anneliese demonstrates the complexity of international recycling deals, the imbalance of power exerted by the Global North onto the Global South within them, and above all, the agency of e-waste workers to organize for improved work conditions. This analysis critiques the globalization of waste and offers evidence-based and worker-led pathways forward for e-waste disposal that promote safe and secure livelihoods without necessitating economic dependence or the degradation of land or bodies. Readers of all disciplines step away from this essay with a firm recognition of the international and intranational collaboration necessary to achieve environmental justice for all, in the recycling industry and beyond.

— Ashley Jankowski

Redefining Global E-waste Management:
How Can We Learn From Agbogbloshie?

Introduction

The 21st century has seen an exponential rise in digital household technologies. When those of the Global North decide to dispose of their toasters, cell phones, or computers, the burden of recycling these devices is often pushed onto countries in the Global South that are less equipped to safely dispose of the electronic waste, or “e-waste.” This e-waste then ends up in hazardous informal dumping sites scattered across the Global South. The largest and most notorious of these e-waste dumping sites was Agbogbloshie, located just outside the Ghanaian capital of Accra until its demolition in 2021 (Lubick 48, Chasant). It served as a hot spot for international researchers who wanted to understand the dangers of improper e-waste disposal methods, but it was also popular among local communities who sought to provide for themselves economically. This is a pattern that puts e-waste sites in a contentious position: while the Global North condemns the sites as environmental disaster areas riddled with crude recycling techniques and toxic chemicals, the people who live there depend on the work that e-waste recycling provides–despite the associated health and environmental risks.

This paper aims to investigate two main research questions. First, how does the practice of e-waste dumping affect the health and livelihoods of marginalized communities in Ghana? Second, what policies or community-based strategies could be implemented to address the environmental injustices caused by e-waste dumping, and which attempts have failed? This paper will analyze the e-waste recycling industry in Ghana–specifically the life cycle of Agbogbloshie–through the lens of colonialism and race to shed light on how decisions about these e-waste sites harm local communities to serve the needs of the Global North. Through this analysis, I make a call to reconfigure both international practices and local environmental policies regarding e-waste dumping in order to bring justice and create a more equitable and sustainable future. To protect the health of the e-waste workers, the economic opportunities of recycling, and the environment in developing countries like Ghana, international and intranational collaboration is essential.

Context

“Toxic colonialism” is a term that refers to how hazardous waste brokers in the Global North continue to exploit the environments of the Global South (Okafor-Yarwood & Adewumi 290). Such a system persists because all countries involved benefit economically: costly environmental regulations in high-income countries incentivize companies to outsource their waste, and the officials of low-to-middle-income countries receive much-needed financial relief–at the expense of polluting their environment (286). Toxic colonialism perpetuates the commodification of land in the Global South and harms the people living there by forcing them to rely on inherently dangerous environmental practices to sustain themselves. From this dynamic, the e-waste recycling industry in Ghana was born.

The quality of employment opportunities in Ghana has been declining since the 1970s when intense industry privatization limited the job market in the formal sector, prompting Ghanaians to work in informal industries like hawking or, more recently, e-waste recycling (Amankwaa 552). Most e-waste workers are young men with low education rates, which limits their financial opportunities to scarce, low-paying jobs (559). However, the daily wage rate for e-waste-related jobs can be almost 7 times higher than Ghana’s minimum wage, incentivizing these young people to take on such work (565). Up to 6,000 people worked directly with recycling in Agbogbloshie, and up to 30,000 people in the Greater Accra region are indirectly involved in the general industry (560). This information reframes e-waste recycling as a full-blown industry rather than isolated scavengers perusing junkyards in their spare time.

However, just because the recycling work functions as its own industry does not at all imply it is a safe or sustainable one. The people who work in e-waste recycling are severely under-resourced. Since the region lacks proper recycling facilities, personal protective gear, and education about how to handle toxic elements properly, workers often resort to crude extraction methods such as burning wires coated in rubber to retrieve copper (Amankwaa 561). These practices expose the workers and the people living near the waste site to health risks such as respiratory infections, cancer, and birth defects (568). One study conducted at Agbogbloshie has shown that workers whose primary work is burning e-waste had up to four times higher levels of toxic elements in their systems compared to workers who sort or collect e-waste (Srigboh). Beyond its onsite health concerns, e-waste recycling has drastic consequences for local food and water sources. Such toxic elements like arsenic, lead, and mercury are released from e-waste recycling practices and then leech into the soil and the nearby Odaw River, affecting not only the workers but everyone in the region (Srigboh; Amankwaa 568). So if all these risks are associated with e-waste work, why do people continue to do it? It is because, under the toxic colonial structure, they do not have another viable financial alternative to support themselves, as 96% of surveyed workers at Agbogbloshie attested (Amankwaa 567). The people of Ghana do not want to live in a hazardous environment or work with toxic chemicals, but the socioeconomic systems they live in necessitate it.

Critical Evaluation of Attempted Policy

Ghana’s government and international organizations have tried for years to make e-waste sites like Agbogbloshie and surrounding areas safer. There have also been an array of policy attempts aimed at addressing the illegal exportation of e-waste to the Global South in general. Despite their good intentions, these policies have all had shortcomings, which are important to consider when proposing solutions to the complicated issue.

Two major international conventions have been implemented to address the issue of waste dumping in the Global South: the 1989 Basel Convention and the 1991 Bamako Convention. The Basel Convention was the first attempt to prohibit the export of hazardous waste to developing countries. It has been criticized because 1) the vague wording in the convention has indirectly encouraged exporting countries to intentionally mislabel containers holding hazardous e-waste and 2) some of the largest e-waste exporters–including the US–refused to implement the convention, thus rendering the policy virtually ineffective (Okafor-Yarwood & Adewumi 295). Since high-income countries take advantage of the wording in the Basel Convention to lie about what waste they are sending to low-to-middle-income countries, the workers are put into further danger since they cannot accurately anticipate what materials their country is taking in. Some scholars estimate that 250,000 metric tons of e-waste illegally enters a collective of five West African countries–Ghana being one–each year (Lubick 48). Researchers generally attribute this phenomenon to ineffective security at the African shipping ports and a lack of investigation into the actual contents of containers (Okafor-Yarwood & Adewumi 298). It is unreasonable to expect Ghanaian port security to scrutinize every single box of imports they receive. That responsibility should be borne by the high-income countries that have the capabilities to comply with these policies, yet they already exhibit an unwillingness to comply with basic regulations by offloading their burden of recycling onto Ghana in the first place. This convention tries to dismantle the toxic colonial structure but ends up perpetuating the secrecy that ensures its longevity.

As a response to the aforementioned weaknesses in the Basel Convention, the stricter Bamako Convention was introduced in 1991 (292). It restricts any toxic waste exports unless the exporting country does not have the proper disposal facilities but the importing country does (297). This convention also failed to clearly define what constitutes ‘proper’ facilities, creating another loophole that high-income countries exploit: it incentivized them not to invest their ample resources and technology into building their own sufficient recycling sites and instead shifted the responsibility onto underresourced communities. Another issue with the Bamako Convention is that while it specifically aimed to protect low-to-middle-income countries from this avenue of toxic colonialism, many countries in West Africa refused to participate since a total ban on e-waste would destroy the informal economies that now sustain thousands of people (297). While it may seem on the surface that abruptly stopping the flow of waste would stop the problems that come with crude e-waste recycling practices, the fact that it has become an integral source of livelihood for many people means that it cannot be entirely stripped away without severe negative consequences. Historical colonial powers infiltrated countries of the Global South for long enough to dismantle their societies and then left them to rebuild after exploitation with little support. Just as traditional colonialism destabilized these communities and created a reliance on Global North powers, we cannot expect these same communities to recover when they have been forced to adapt to the system of toxic colonialism.

Beyond these failed international policy efforts, a more local lens indicates that there has been an increased focus within Ghana on the need to recognize the e-waste recycling industry as a legitimate industry that is serving the community around it, even if it is also causing harm. E-waste scavengers fill gaps in the waste collection infrastructure around Accra by collecting and recycling local e-waste–alongside international e-waste–that would otherwise be left in the streets (Sovacool 21). Additionally, while the workers themselves experience a decent payout compared to other jobs in Ghana, the industry as a whole generates between 105 million and 268 million dollars annually within the country (Amankwaa 560). This is a significant amount of money that contributes to Ghana’s economy, and it should not be undervalued. The workers of Agbogbloshie recognized their social and economic contributions and strived to protect their safety by forming a union called ASDA, the Agbogbloshie Scrap Dealers Association (Amankwaa 555). These co-ops are essential to organize the work happening in these recycling sites so that the industry can be more efficient and safe, which in turn benefits everyone around the site. The initiatives led by ASDA have had sincere impacts on the community; if the Ghanaian government were to recognize them as a genuine business entity and collaborate with them, there could be even more resources and programs put in place to improve conditions (Sovacool 18).

However, the government refuses to coordinate with the workers or acknowledge the structure of the industry, which has had devastating consequences. In July 2021, Ghana’s government demolished the Agbogbloshie e-waste site in the name of eradicating the environmental “wasteland;” they gave no notice to the workers, destroyed the homes of the approximately 8,000 people who lived onsite, and left thousands more without their source of livelihood (Amankwaa 571; Chasant). Agbogbloshie was already built on a history of displacement: the population who lived and worked near the site before its demolition was initially displaced from Accra 30 years prior when the city government relocated squatters in order to “give the city a beautiful facelift” (Amankwaa 556). This dispossession of land for the perceived preservation of the environment–whether urban or natural–is defined as “green grabbing” (Fairhead 237). Since the demolition happened recently, there is little scholarship analyzing the effects of the disruption. Whatever the effects, it is unjust for the government to have destroyed the site without notice and to have taken the land from the already displaced communities who relied on it without negotiations.

Green grabbing also seeks to protect the land from “assumed destructive local practices” (Fairhead 237). In the case of Agbogbloshie, it would be impossible to argue that the recycling practices were not harmful to both the health of the people and the environment. However, when providing recommendations for how to address the issue of e-waste in Agbogbloshie, several scholars explicitly warned against total demolition of the site as a solution to the environmental problems. Some experts claimed that the “standard of practices at Agbogbloshie are far superior to these other scattered sites, [and dispersing the work] would only widen the environmental crisis” (Sovacool 22). The practices were unsafe and unregulated, but at least they were contained to one consolidated area which made the work more efficient; now, e-waste recycling is spread across the city and its outskirts. This dispersion forces the community of workers to function individually instead of as a collective, making the hazardous work more intertwined with people's living spaces and polluting more areas of land with toxic waste (Muntaka). In its attempt to rid the city of unsafe e-waste recycling practices, the government managed to undo much of the progress achieved at Agbogbloshie and made conditions for e-waste workers worse.

Proposed Solutions

All of these attempted solutions to address the economic reliance on and environmental impacts of e-waste recycling have fallen short in one way or another, which indicates that the current global and local approaches are not properly considering the needs of those involved. It is difficult to create a solution that strikes a balance between maintaining the economic viability of the current system for both e-waste workers and tech companies while also protecting the health of the workers and environments impacted by it. One party has to make sacrifices. Given that the e-waste recyclers of the Global South have already suffered extreme physical detriment and marginalization under the current system, I recommend two potential solutions that could benefit the most people and create a more just future. The first recommendation is for the Ghanaian government to work in collaboration with the e-waste recyclers to aid in improving the industry; the second is for the companies located in the Global North responsible for exporting e-waste to countries like Ghana to accept responsibility for their waste.

After the unprecedented demolition of Agbogbloshie, it is clear that there must be more open communication channels between the e-waste workers and the government. The workers knew that it was safer to keep the recycling industry around Accra mostly contained within Agbogbloshie so that it could function more like a formalized industry, hence why they formed ASDA in the first place (Amankwaa 571). Both the workers and the government want to make work and living spaces cleaner–and therefore safer–for the people in the area. The issue lies in the fact that the Agbogbloshie workers were willing to negotiate with the government, but the government refused to even acknowledge them (Muntaka).

According to David Schlosberg’s theories of justice, there are two main forms of justice missing from this situation: recognition justice and procedural justice. There is a “lack of recognition in the social and political realms” and a “devaluation” of Ghana’s e-waste recycling industry (Schlosberg 14). While the industry is by no means perfect, the Global North and the Ghanaian government both perpetuate its reputation as a toxic wasteland, which is a dangerous foundation for the dispossession and disenfranchisement of the people who work in it. Such a reputation has contributed to the lack of procedural justice present within the Ghanaian government, where “fair and equitable institutional processes of a state,” are not applied to the e-waste industry (Schlosberg 25). The fact that state officials demolished Agbogbloshie without even informing the workers–let alone negotiating with them–exemplifies the extent to which the rights of these workers are disrespected. If the government were to recognize all of the genuine value produced by this industry and treat the workers as professionals to be negotiated with and protected, the industry could become much safer and more productive. The aim of this paper is not to encourage governments to support current unsafe recycling practices. Instead, it promotes making efforts to support the initiatives led by the workers who know what their industry needs and to treat e-waste workers with the same respect as other formal sector workers.

Even if the Ghanaian government changes its relationship with e-waste workers, the country is still severely under-resourced. Ghana continues to import e-waste despite the problems it presents because the government depends on the financial support it brings. From building new recycling centers with more efficient technology to ensuring better security at ports, reforming the recycling industry to protect the workers and environment will be incredibly expensive. It is unrealistic to assume that a country that must choose between polluting its environment and providing economic opportunities for its people would be able to collect the technologies or funds required to implement expensive reforms. Countries in the Global North send their e-waste to places like Ghana “despite the presence of efficient [national] recycling facilities” (Lubick 48). This means that the Global North possesses the knowledge and resources to dispose of e-waste properly, but will not share or use it. Conventions like the Bamako Convention incentivize taking advantage of the Global South instead since it is cheaper to export e-waste than it is to create or use their own facilities (Okafor-Yarwood & Adewumi 290). A theoretical solution to this issue would be to push the cost of creating new recycling centers in Ghana onto the companies of the Global North. However, this could deter them from exporting any e-waste at all since they could instead recycle it in their own country for a similar price. This would destroy the industry that has built up in Ghana and would harm the workers who rely economically on the waste. So, a balance must be struck.

While the specific economics are beyond the scope of this paper, low-to-middle-income countries could require a certain amount of money from e-waste exporting companies to fund more sustainable recycling practices in the Global South. The amount would fall somewhere between the current–fairly unregulated–rate but still be less than the cost it would be to recycle the e-waste in a high-income country. A policy like this would force companies from the Global North to accept some responsibility for their actions while still providing an economic incentive for them to contribute to the recycling industry they created in places like Ghana. Such a stream of funding would enable Ghana to build quality facilities to dispose of the waste safely and would create even more job opportunities within the industry. It is important to note that this solution hinges entirely on the idea that every low-to-middle-income country must enforce a similar policy. Otherwise, companies could move their exploitative practices to yet another country in the Global South and repeat the toxic colonial cycle. It is unfair to put the burden of enforcement onto developing countries, but policies like the Basel Convention have shown that countries in the Global North prioritize their economic success over actively protecting the people and environment of the Global South. Protective policies created by collaborative international efforts across low-to-middle-income countries could force high-income countries to start breaking the cycle of toxic colonialism.

Conclusion

Examining the development of the e-waste recycling industry around Agbogbloshie reveals an undeniable pattern that the disposal practices preferred by the Global North exploit the land and labor of people in the Global South. This harms the health of the workers and their environment, entangling them in the cycle of toxic colonialism. While there is no perfect solution to solve the issue of global e-waste recycling processes, holding companies financially responsible and recognizing the recyclers of the Global South as part of a viable industry that deserves respect and protection can be an important start. Moving forward, all countries and companies need to re-evaluate their priorities and their views of Global South e-waste recyclers. Prioritizing the well-being of the planet and people around the world should replace excessive profit. Only by making these changes can we forge a more sustainable and equitable future for everyone.

Work Cited

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Chasant, Muntaka. “Agbogbloshie Demolition: The End of an ERA or an Injustice?” Muntaka.Com, 22 Oct. 2023, www.muntaka.com/agbogbloshie-demolition/.

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