The legitimate, safe disposal of waste has been a problem for many countries for a number of years. A plethora of international laws and regulations have so far failed to regulate a global market in which unscrupulous operators are able to profit from disposing of waste cheaply and illegally abroad.
A report by Interpol found that waste was being illegally disposed of by mixing it with cement or asphalt- Anne Zammit
Radioactive waste from Italy dumped in Somalia is thought to have been behind health problems of Italian soldiers based there with a UN force in the mid-1990s. A report by Interpol published some five years ago found that waste was being illegally disposed of in Italy by mixing it with cement or asphalt. There were even cases of waste being mixed into fertiliser which was then spread on land where dairy cattle grazed.
An early example of the involvement of traditional organised crime in the solid waste industry is seen in 1970s New York. Under the guise of legitimate business, organised crime groups used property rights, predatory pricing and threats of violence to dominate the solid waste industry.
Waste hauling contracts were illegally shared out between affiliated haulers. Non-affiliated firms were pressured with threats and violence to either join the infrastructure or exit the business, creating a system of territorial monopolies with non-competitive pricing.
In 2009, the Interpol Pollution Crime Working Group published a report on links between organised crime and the disposal of electronic waste. Research in the UK and Europe conducted for this report by Bureau Veritas suggested that a highly profitable illegal industry had developed around trade of electronic waste.
The report identified “waste tourists” as individuals or groups who temporarily travel to the UK from Asia and West Africa to buy up electronic waste for export and are then involved in its illegal disposal by dodging port customs authorities.
A common method of improper disposal appears to be done by mixing illegal shipments of electronic waste with legal shipments of second-hand or end-of-life vehicles. It was found that some ‘waste’ companies in the UK act as middlemen, claiming to take waste for recycling while being paid by a local authority to remove the waste only to sell it straight on to a broker and getting paid twice.
The report noted that the introduction of a directive on waste electrical and electronic equipment in Europe could actually have had the effect of increasing problems of illegal export. This would be especially true in countries where there was a lack of processing and recycling capacity for electronic waste, providing an opening for criminal operators.
Interpol’s report concluded that a better understanding is needed of destinations and routes used to carry illegal shipments (which sometimes double as drug routes), while loopholes and gaps in legislation that currently enable illegal waste shipments to occur should be identified.
The European Union Network for the Implementation and Enforcement of Environmental Law aims to help member states better understand their own contribution to this problem and how they might tackle illegal electronic waste exports more effectively.
In a ‘Learning through doing’ project involving 22 EU member states including Malta, port inspections in different countries revealed 10 cases of illegal export of end-of-life vehicles and 29 of electronic waste to countries such as Ghana and Nigeria prior to 2009.
Participation by Malta got off to a sluggish start but appears to be improving slowly. Twelve containers held at storage and sorting facilities were investigated in three inspections carried out.
A report on the results of the Maltese inspections was compiled but it was sent in too late to be included in the final report on enforcement of waste shipment regulations published last April. Italy, Macedonia and Iceland failed to report inspection results.
This may reflect a reluctance on the part of the competent authority – the Malta Environment and Planning Authority – to allocate enough human resources to keep up with the workload that such projects entail.
The enforcement network aims to promote and improve inspections and enforcement of waste shipments inside and outside the EU under the revised Waste Shipment Regulation 1013/06 which has been in force since 2007.
Transfer of waste of any kind, whether hazardous or non-hazardous, on Maltese territory or waters is regulated by a legal notice which came into force at the beginning of June. Responsibility now falls on the occupier of a household to make sure that any rubbish produced on his property is only given to an authorised waste collector.
Larger scale activities such as the civic amenity sites, quarries used for storage and industrial zone facilities require an environmental permit.
General binding rules have been set out by Mepa for those enterprises dealing in waste as carriers or brokers on a smaller scale. The authority is bound to keep a register of all such operators.
Under new legislation, reclassifying of hazardous waste as non-hazardous may generally no longer be achieved by diluting or mixing waste with the aim of lowering initial concentrations of hazardous substances to a level below thresholds defining it as hazardous.
A spokesman for Mepa comments that the public consultation phase on general binding rules for brokers and carriers has ended and it is expected that regulation Legal Notice 106/07 will be updated in due course.
On Tuesday a seminar organised by the Malta-EU Steering and Action Committee and Mepa will be held in Gozo. Malta’s draft plan for waste electrical and electronic equipment is to be presented along with an action plan for noise, mainly from trans-port, falling under the relevant directive.
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