WASTE CRIME – WASTE RISKS

able to expand its trading networks incrementally through a
variety of players, such as e-waste importers, informal collectors,
dealers of secondary materials, and informal recyclers.
Hong Kong is regarded as an important e-waste trading hub.
Informal recyclers tend to cluster around the key waterways
and ports of entry, suggesting that the input materials
for recycling are imported. The business has spread from
Guangdong Province to other regions, such as Guangxi,
Zhejiang, Shanghai, Tianjin, Hunan, Fujian, and Shandong
(Wang et al. 2013). Recycling or disposal facilities in the
developing world are often very basic. The town of Guiyu in
Guangdong Province – often referred to as the WEEE capital
of the world – is home to more than 300 companies and 3
000 individual workshops that employ people in informal
recycling activities, such as extracting metals from computer
circuit boards and burning the plastic off copper cables
(Wang et al. 2013). Artisan recycling is very labour-intensive.
Most of the workers in Guiyu are rural migrants coming
from neighbouring agrarian regions and working for relatively
low wages. Many of these workers are women and children
(Wang et al. 2013).
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