Kenya now among top dumping grounds for electronic waste

Kenya has been identified as one of the world’s leading dumping grounds for electronic waste.

The waste comes in the form of cheap cables, used toys, LED-decorated novelty clothes, cheap vaping devices, and countless other small consumer items often not recognised by consumers as e-waste.

This form of waste, also sent to many other countries globally, amounts to nine billion kilogrammes of e-waste, one-sixth of all e-waste worldwide.  

“This ‘invisible’ category of e-waste in one place would equal the weight of almost half a million 40-tonne trucks, enough to form a 5,640km bumper-to-bumper line of trucks from Rome to Nairobi," says a report by Weee Forum, a Brussels-based not-for-profit which tracks e-waste globally.

“Many of these devices, such as vapes, gaining in popularity in some societies, contain lithium, which makes their battery rechargeable but also causes serious fire risks when the device is discarded,” it said in a report.

E-waste is the world’s fastest-growing waste stream.

Kenya is a prime destination for illegal imports of e-waste due to its relatively lax regulations, lower recycling costs, and the absence of stringent enforcement mechanisms.

The country struggles with 5,100 metric tonnes of e-waste every year, according to the government.

The Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) Forum, which organises International E-Waste Day, commissioned the United Nations Institute for Training and Research to calculate the annual quantities of ‘invisible’ e-waste items.

The organisation said some 3.2 billion kilogrammes, 35 per cent of the roughly nine billion kilogrammes of invisible e-waste globally, are in the e-toy category: race car sets, electric trains, music toys, talking dolls and other robotic figures, biking computers, drones.

The study also found that 950 million kilogrammes of cables containing precious, easily recyclable copper were discarded last year globally – enough cable to circle the Earth 107 times.

Many are stored in homes, perhaps put aside for potential future use.  Many people don’t realise they could be recycled – a huge sleeping resource, at a time when demand for copper is forecast to rise sixfold by 2030 in Europe alone, to meet the needs of strategic sectors such as renewable energy, electric mobility, industry, communications, aerospace and defense.

“Other examples of common, invisible e-waste items in households include toothbrushes, shavers, external drives and accessories, headphones and earbuds, remote controls, speakers, LED lights, power tools, household medical equipment, heat and smoke detectors and many others,” the report said.

WEEE Forum director general Said Pascal Leroy said invisible e-waste goes unnoticed due to its nature or appearance, leading consumers to overlook its recyclable potential.

“People tend to recognise household electrical products as those they plug in and use regularly. But many people are confused about the waste category into which ancillary, peripheral, specialist, hobby, and leisure products fit and how to have them recycled.”

In Europe, thanks to 20 years of Extended Producer Responsibility legislation, 55 per cent of e-waste generated is now officially collected and reported. Still, according to the United Nations global e-waste monitor,  other parts of the world show much slower growth rates in its collection, and globally, the reported average collection rate is just over 17 per cent.

“Not only producers but all relevant actors, including regulators, consumers, refurbishers, reuse outfits, scrap dealers, retailers and recyclers, must play a role in the EPR system to successfully increase the collection of e-waste,” says Jan Vlak, the president of the WEEE Forum.

According to the United Nations, eight kilos of e-waste per person will be produced worldwide in 2023. Only 17.4 per cent of this waste, containing harmful substances and precious materials, will be recorded as properly collected, treated, and recycled globally.

The remaining tens of millions of tonnes will be placed in landfills, burned, illegally traded, improperly treated, or hoarded in households.