As we continually update and invent new products the life of the old ones is getting shorter and shorter. Like shipbreaking, e-waste recycling involves the major producers and users, shipping the obsolete products to Asia, Eastern Europe, and Africa. But instead of being “green” we are exporting a sack full of problems to people who have to choose between poverty or poison. This graphic illustrates major receivers of e-waste in Asia.

In the 1980s severe hygienic problems plagued parts of Curitiba where housing development was uncontrolled. The winding streets were too narrow for council trucks and waste rotting in the open caused disease. In 1989 the council decided to act. It sent environmental education teams into affected areas where they joined forces with neighbourhood associations to organise waste collection by local people.

According to Residua, a UK company working on solid waste issues, about 50 per cent of European goods are wrapped in plastic (17 per cent by weight). There are many types of plastic packaging: plastic bottles are often made of polyethylene terephthalate (PET), yoghurt pots are mostly polypropylene (PP), wrapping film, bin liners and flexible containers are usually low-density polyethylene (LDPE) and so on. This diversity partly explains why re...