Thread: Recycled electronics are turning Thailand into a 'dumping ground for hazardous waste'

Payao Charoonwong says a local e-waste recycling facility has destroyed her village's main water supply.

Electronic waste from Western countries, including Australia, is flooding the shores of South-East Asian nations like Thailand, sparking fears of air and water pollution.

Key points:

• Environmental activists say there are many illegal e-waste processing facilities in Thailand
• China banned the importation of foreign waste in 2018
• Australia sent 250,000 kilos of e-waste to Thailand in 2018, a 500-fold increase on 2017

Global waste markets were upended in 2018 when China implemented tough new import restrictions on plastic and e-waste materials from foreign nations, forcing countries to find new markets.

Countries are taking advantage of the lax environmental regulations in Asia, redirecting trash China will no longer take to countries like Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia.
But the rapid shift in global markets has had a devastating flow-on effect to communities now dealing with a flood of contaminated waste.

In Thailand, scores of new sorting and recycling companies — many of them illegal and with Chinese shareholders — have sprung up in provinces surrounding the country's main port of Laem Chabang.


Chachoengsao, east of Bangkok, has became a dumping ground for the west's e-waste


Referring to a local water supply ...

Water tests conducted in the province by environmental group Earth and the local government both found toxic levels of iron, manganese, lead, nickel and in some cases arsenic and cadmium.

"The communities observed when they used water from the shallow well, there was some development of skin disease or there are foul smells," founder of Earth, Penchom Saetang said.

"This is proof, that it is true, as the communities suspected, there are problems happening to their water sources."

Full story here

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Normally I don't do News Items any more, but I thought this story shouldn't be missed.