Printable version from NI Global Issues for Learners of English:
Toxic Waste:
An Export from the US to BrazilThe Basel Convention forbids the shipment of toxic waste from industrialised countries to the developing world. But in spite of this, toxic products find their way to developing countries, causing pollution and health problems.
It's a hot September day in north-east Brazil. There is a hill, with a small river at the bottom. A young woman and two young men are walking carefully up the hill, towards a square building at the top. Now and then, one of them stops and bends down. After a while, they turn around and go back down the hill. A car is waiting for them. They get in, and the car drives away.
Who are they? What are they doing?
They are members of three Brazilian environmental groups. The square building at the top of the hill is a factory that recycles lead car batteries. The company that owns the factory is called Metalurgica Bitury.
The three young people were collecting samples of the soil and water in the area around the factory. They also took photographs of the large piles of lead batteries in the factory yard. These batteries are covered with lead dust. When it rains, the lead dust is washed into the river at the bottom of the hill. The young people took a piece of a battery from the factory too: it showed where the battery was made, in the USA.
The samples were analysed. The amount of lead in some of the soil and water was 10 to 15 times greater than the amount of lead that is legal in the United States, where the batteries came from.
LEAD: a soft metal which can be poisonous especially to children [pronounced /led/].
BATTERIES: Batteries provide electricity. A lead car battery is a car battery made using lead.
ANALYSED: carefully examined and separated into its parts.
LEGAL: allowed by law
Why companies in rich countries export waste
Many companies in the rich countries want to export their toxic waste. Why? Because it is expensive to process it in their own countries, where they must be careful about pollution. It is cheaper to send the waste to developing countries, where some companies do not spend money to protect the environment or their workers. Workers are treated badly
In addition to polluting the environment, Metalurgica Bitury in Brazil is accused of treating its workers badly. Workers can get lead poisoning from working with the batteries. But local trade unions say that when workers get high levels of lead in their blood, the company fires them and does not give them any compensation money.
Take Genivaldo Cavalcante da Silva, for example. He is 38 years old. He worked for Metalurgica Bitury for 9 years. "I was forced to leave because I had lead in my brain. I can't even walk properly," he said. "I have three children and big financial problems." Many other workers have the same kind of problems as da Silva.
COMPENSATION MONEY: money that someone pays because they have harmed you.
The Basel Convention may help, but ...
The situation should improve after January 1998: Brazil signed the Basel Convention and the Convention says that importing toxic waste for recycling must stop then. This means that Brazilian companies should no longer be able to import lead car batteries.
Unfortunately, the situation is more complicated. A group of companies, including a sister company of Metalurgica Bitury, are fighting against this ban. They want to continue recycling imported lead batteries. At first, the Brazilian Environment Ministry supported them and tried to get special agreement for them to continue.
However, the environmental groups took action. They showed the photographs of Metalurgica Bitury to the Minister of the Environment and presented the evidence of lead pollution. They told the stories of the poisoned workers who had been fired from their jobs. The Minister was afraid of a public scandal and he is no longer asking for a special agreement. The environmentalists are winning so far, but the Brazilian companies are still trying to find another way to continue importing batteries from the United States.
Environmentalists are worried
This story explains why some supporters of the Basel Convention are worried. They fear that some industries in some countries will get special agreements to continue importing toxic waste, and so those industries will continue to pollute their workers and the environment. The environmentalists are also worried because America refuses to sign the Convention and it is one of the biggest producers of dangerous waste in the world.
Environmental groups must continue to be active and watchful if the Basel Convention is really going to stop the industrialised world from sending its pollution to developing countries.
The article "Ship of Ills" by Marijane Lisboa, on which this was based, appeared in the October 1997 issue of the New Internationalist.Copyright 1997, 1998: the New Internationalist
Last Modified: 20 Sept 2000