India becoming the world’s dumping ground? for e-waste »

India has become the dumping ground for our e-waste, everything from computers, phones, televisions and whitegoods are illegally being exported to India. A lack of regulation and increasing 'throw away' culture in India has led to the country becoming the world's biggest dumping ground for discarded electronic goods, a conference at The Australian National University (ANU) will hear. Co-convener of the World-making and the environment in the Asia-Pacific region conference, Dr Assa Doron of the ANU School of Culture, History and Language, will highlight the issue at the event which aims to explore the relationship between global issues and local solutions. "India has become the dumping ground for our e-waste," Dr Doron said. "Everything from computers, phones, televisions and whitegoods are illegally being exported to India." "The country has also become a huge consumer hub itself where a lot of the electronic goods are being disposed of as India adopts a 'throw away' society. "In the West we like to throw things away and forget about them. We engage in these pious everyday rituals of recycling, but these electronic goods are ending up in third-world countries." According to the 2015 United Nations Environment Programme up to 90 per cent of the world's electronic waste is illegally dumped in India; this is on top of the estimated 1.8 million mertic tonnes of e-waste produced domestically each year.