WASTE CRIME – WASTE RISKS

Impact of illegal traffic of waste
• The lack of environmentally sound management of
waste, including its dumping, following an illegal
transboundary movement may have severe implications
for the environment and human health, and the
subsequent clean-up is an economic burden.
• Illegal traffic of waste has an adverse effect on trade
and competition, putting law-abiding businesses at an
economic disadvantage.
• Illegal traffic undermines international policy, the rule
of law, and enforcement efforts.
agreement among some African countries which came into
force in 1998, is similar to the Basel Convention in format
and language, but much stronger in prohibiting all imports of
hazardous wastes from outside the African continent. Unlike
the Basel Convention, it does not exclude from its scope radioactive
wastes subject to other international control systems.
Another example of a regional agreement is the Convention to
Ban the Importation of Hazardous and Radioactive Waste and
to Control the Transboundary Movement and Management of
Hazardous Waste within the South Pacific Region, also known
as the Waigani Convention. Like the Bamako Convention, the
Waigani Convention also includes radioactive waste. It only
applies to the Pacific region, but obligations are similar to the
Basel Convention. The Waigani Convention currently has 13
signatories (SREP 2013).
Since March 1992, the transboundary movement of wastes
destined for recovery operations between member countries
of the OECD has been supervised and controlled under a
specific intra-OECD Control System (OECD 2015). It aims at
facilitating trade of recyclables in an environmentally sound
and economically efficient manner by using a simplified
procedure, along with a risk-based approach to assessing
the necessary level of control for materials. Wastes exported
outside the OECD area, whether for recovery or final disposal,
do not benefit from this simplified control procedure.
tion of the environment, its effects on international trade
being only incidental” (European Parliament 2006). It aims
at strengthening, simplifying, and specifying the procedures
for controlling waste shipments in order to improve environmental
protection. It also seeks to introduce into European
Community (EC) legislation the provisions of the Basel
Convention, the Ban amendment, as well as the revision of
the OECD 2001 Decision on the Control of Transboundary
Movements of Wastes Destined for Recovery Operations.
The Bamako Convention on the Ban of the Import into Africa
and the Control of Transboundary Movement and Management
of Hazardous Wastes within Africa (UNEP n.d.), a regional
It should also noted that the Basel Convention allows the
Parties to define the wastes in addition to the Convention
lists and recognizes the right of the Parties to regulate their
import/export of wastes (Articles 3.1 and 4.1). The implementation
and enforcement of the Basel Convention and other
regional instruments largely depends on national legislation
and institutional structures governing transboundary shipments
of hazardous waste and other wastes.
What is waste?
The first and probably most complex question is whether a
certain substance or object is waste. Modern recycling involves
innovative technologies to move waste back into the produc-
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