Environmental Organised Crime: The Dirty Business of Hazardous Waste Disposal and Limited State Capacity in Africa

ABSTRACT

Illegal transnational hazardous waste disposal was in the past not defined as a serious environmental crime as the crime is mostly victimless. Although there is a large global legal hazardous waste disposal industry, there is also an illicit one, involving illegal companies, disposal methods, terrorist and organised criminal groups. This article examines illicit hazardous waste disposal (e-waste) on the African continent, against the backdrop of Green Theory and Green Criminology. There are numerous e-waste sites and this article discusses a few in West Africa. Although tons of e-waste makes its way illegally into Africa from the developed North, large volumes are produced domestically. These sites provide a source of income for thousands of people, but the local environment (plus human health) is damaged. Due to limited state capacity there are few examples of Green States on the continent. The state needs to step in as the regulator and facilitator of e-governance. The issue of e-waste in Africa is complex and warrants much more research from a Political Science perspective and requires more academic exposure in the Social Sciences in order to be placed on the domestic research and policy agenda.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. See, for example, the commentary by Kalron (2013) Neo-conservation: A Commentary on the Future security of Africa’'s Wildlife.

2. For more information on the illicit global political economy, the following text can be consulted: Heine, J. and R. Thakur, eds. 2011. The Dark Side of Globalization. Tokyo: UNU Press.

3. The major issue with hazardous waste disposal is related to the definition of what constitutes as hazardous waste. There is thus no formal definition of hazardous waste, and the emergence of various legislations, regulations and conventions adds to its complexity. Many corporations/generators and exporters are unsure about whether their waste is regarded as being hazardous or non-hazardous. It is ‘therefore, many exporters who may be trying to comply with regulations may, actually be violating them’ (Pinzon 1994, 180).

4. For example, in 1998, the military forces of Rwanda and Uganda, along with the Congolese soldiers of the RCD (Rassemblement Congolais la Democratie) took control of eastern DRC, and immediately started to stockpile and extract natural resources from the area. Although the primary focus was on gold and coltan, they also exploited diamond deposits. According to Samset (2002, 471), ‘ … diamonds have contributed to financing the war effort, in terms of paying up for military equipment, food, wages and medicine’ and has also been used as a way to pay for imports, especially with regards to arms dealing.

5. See the example of Koko, Nigeria as explained later in the article.

6. It was estimated that in 2014 the Ikeja computer village contributed 2% to the GDP (Nurudeen 2016).

7. Legitimate businesses dispose of e-waste through recycling, which is usually sold to Asian companies who then extract components that can be used again. However, the negative aspect of the recycling market is that many recycling firms in Asia tend to exploit women and children for economic gain (Schmidt 2006, A234).