What is Waste Colonialism ?

The term waste colonialism was coined in 1989 at the United Nations Environmental Programme Basel Convention working group “when African nations articulated concerns about the disposal of hazardous wastes by high GDP countries into low GDP countries.”

Waste colonialism has evolved to describe the pollution of poorer nations by richer ones and can be witnessed with the shipping of millions of tonnes of plastic, clothing and textiles and e-waste to the Global South.

Initially, the economic benefits of importing waste seemed to outweigh the societal and environmental harms for nations in the Global South but the import has now become a social and environmental burden.

Take Ghana, for example, home to West Africa’s largest second hand clothing market. Every week, over 15m garments arrive, 40% of which will never be fit for resale, resigned to live the rest of their lives polluting the local environment or fuelling landfill fires

What is Waste Colonialism ?