{"id":126656,"date":"2019-01-28T12:00:24","date_gmt":"2019-01-28T12:00:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=126656"},"modified":"2019-01-26T15:03:22","modified_gmt":"2019-01-26T15:03:22","slug":"environment-and-health-at-increasing-risk-from-growing-weight-of-e-waste","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2019\/01\/environment-and-health-at-increasing-risk-from-growing-weight-of-e-waste\/","title":{"rendered":"Environment and Health at Increasing Risk from Growing Weight of \u2018E-Waste\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Around 50 million tonnes of electronic waste, or e-waste, is being thrown away each year, according to a new joint United Nations report \u2013 which exceeds the combined weight of all the commercial airliners ever made, or alternatively, enough Eiffel Towers to fill the whole of Manhattan.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

24 Jan 2019 – <\/em>To highlight the rising challenge posed by mountains of discarded electronics worldwide, seven UN entities came together to launch the report at the World Economic Forum <\/a>in Davos, Switzerland, on Thursday, in a bid to offer some solutions to a behemoth-sized problem that is making the world sicker and adding to environmental degradation.<\/p>\n

The joint report, entitled, \u201cA New Circular Vision for Electronics \u2013 Time for a Global Reboot\u201d, calls for a new vision for e-waste based on the \u201ccircular economy\u201d concept, whereby a regenerative system can minimize waste and energy leakage.<\/p>\n

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Source: ITU – The Global E-wasteMonitor 2017<\/p><\/div>\n

\u201cE-waste is a growing global challenge<\/a> that poses a serious threat to the environment and human health worldwide\u201d, said Stephan Sicars, Director of the Department of Environment at the UN Industrial Development Organization. \u201cTo minimize this threat, UNIDO works with various UN agencies and other partners on a range of e-waste projects, all of which are underpinned by a circular economy approach\u201d.<\/p>\n

According to the report, a deliberative process must be instilled to change the system \u2013 one that collaborates with major brands, small and medium-sized enterprises, academia, trade unions and civil society.<\/p>\n

Walking the talk – <\/em><\/strong>Considerable work is already under way to harness a circular economy. For example, the Nigerian Government, the Global Environment Facility and UN Environment announced a $2 million investment to formalize an e-waste recycling industry in Nigeria. The new investment will leverage over $13 million in additional financing from the private sector.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\u201cThousands of tonnes of e-waste is disposed of by the world\u2019s poorest workers in the worst of conditions, putting their health and lives at risk\u201d, maintained Guy Ryder, Director-General, International Labour Organization<\/a> (ILO). \u201cWe need better e-waste strategies and green standards as well as closer collaboration between governments, employers and unions to make the circular economy work for both people and planet.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Despite growing e-waste, \u201cA New Circular Vision\u201d points to the importance of technologies from the so-called Internet of Things \u2013 a network of devices that contain electronics and the connectivity that allows them to exchange data \u2013 through to cloud computing advances, which can all result in smarter recycling and tracking of e-waste.<\/p>\n

\u201cA circular economy brings with it tremendous environmental and economic benefits for us all\u201d said Joyce Msuya, Acting Executive Director, UN Environment Programme (UN Environment). \u201cOur planet\u2019s survival will depend on how well we retain the value of products within the system by extending their life.\u201d<\/p>\n

The report supports the work of the E-waste Coalition, which includes International Labour Organization (ILO<\/a>);\u00a0International Telecommunication Union (ITU<\/a>);\u00a0United Nations Environment Programme (UN Environment<\/a>);\u00a0United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO<\/a>);\u00a0United Nations Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR<\/a>);\u00a0United Nations University (UNU<\/a>) and\u00a0Secretariats of the Basel and Stockholm Conventions.<\/p>\n

Go to Original \u2013 news.un.org<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

24 Jan 2019 – Around 50 million tonnes of electronic waste, or e-waste, is being thrown away each year, according to a new joint United Nations report \u2013 which exceeds the combined weight of all the commercial airliners ever made, or alternatively, enough Eiffel Towers to fill the whole of Manhattan.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":126657,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[61],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-126656","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-environment"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/126656","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=126656"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/126656\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/126657"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=126656"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=126656"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=126656"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}