MALAYSIA continues to be a dumping ground for plastic and electronics waste from rich nations such as the US, said Sahabat Alam Malaysia (SAM).

SAM secretary Mageswari Sangaralingam said the trend was increasing despite the pressure from the authorities and non-governmental organisations (NGO) to battle the global scourge of illegal dumping of non-recyclable items such as plastics and electronic components.

With local agents in cahoots with international syndicates to conceal and illegally store such items in warehouses in the country, Mageswari said that more must be done to curb it.

Earlier today, SAM issued a joint statement with the Seattle-based Basel Action Network (BAN) on the dumping of toxins in developing nations, especially Malaysia.

“We applaud our enforcement agencies for working with NGOs nationally and internationally to end waste trafficking and urge them to be vigilant against possible corruption.”

The containers must not only be sent back but all parties trafficking or enabling illegal e-waste and plastic waste must be held accountable, Mageswari said.

She made the remarks in the wake of the tip by BAN on illegal dumping of waste.

BAN is a global watchdog working to prevent the dumping of toxic waste by rich, industrialized countries in developing countries.

Malaysia announced recently that they seized 301 of the 453 intermodal containers BAN had identified in their alerts. 

Of these, 106 were found to contain illegal electronic waste (e-waste).

In a press conference in Klang, Natural Resources and Environmental Sustainability Minister Nik Nazmi Nik Ahmad expressed appreciation for BAN’s collaboration and noted that another 200 containers remain to be opened and inspected.

BAN has been active on the issue of e-waste trafficking since 2002 when they first revealed the existence of a massive export pathway from North America, Europe, and Japan to Guiyu, China, where computers, printers, and screens were smashed, burned, flushed with acids, and smelted in highly polluting operations. 

Since then, BAN has brought global attention to the e-waste crisis and has worked within the United Nations Basel Convention that obliges countries to strictly control the trade of hazardous or problematic waste such as e-waste. 

BAN was instrumental in ensuring that mainland China, and later Hong Kong, prohibited e-waste imports.

“We welcome the opportunity to assist the Malaysian government with high-quality enforcement intelligence so they can do their job to detain these shipments and arrest any accomplices, including company directors and complicit officials on their side,” said Jim Puckett, BAN executive director. 

“We will also do all we can to see that the US government takes these containers back, and that exporters are held to account.”

BAN uses GPS trackers, and other techniques to trace the flows of e-waste across the globe. – June 27, 2024.