How European waste ends up illegally in Southeast Asia

Brussels: Southeast Asian countries, including Malaysia, Vietnam, Thailand and Indonesia, are experiencing an influx of illegal waste shipments from industrialized countries, a significant portion of which is trafficked from Europe.

Criminal actors are exploiting legal loopholes and legitimate business structures, making waste trading one of the top crimes that can harm the environment, according to a new UN report mapping waste trading trends in Europe and Southeast Asia .

Despite existing regulations, traffickers are empowered by ineffective law enforcement and low penalties if caught, and are tempted by opportunities to make easy profits.

The European Commission estimates that 15 to 30% of waste shipments from the EU are illegal, generating billions of euros in illegal revenues every year.

“If waste is disposed of properly, it becomes a problem for everyone. The urgency of tackling the waste trade cannot be overstated,” Masood Karimipour, Southeast Asia representative of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, told DW.

According to the UN report, ASEAN countries collectively imported more than 100 million tons of metal, paper and plastic waste between 2017 and 2021, worth almost 50 billion dollars (47 billion euros).

The global waste trade has undergone a significant shift in recent years due to a series of measures taken by China in 2018 to tackle the influx of unwanted waste into the country.

The ripple effect of China’s waste ban led to a reorientation of global waste flows, especially towards Southeast Asia.

Countries such as Indonesia have become the main destinations for both legitimate and illegal waste shipments.
“In Indonesia, there is no ecosystem that supports sustainable consumption, production and recycling,” Yuyun Ismawati, senior advisor at environmental NGO Nexus3 Foundation, told DW.

According to the Indonesian Bureau of Statistics, Indonesia experienced a sudden increase in waste imports after 2018, with paper and plastic waste mainly shipped from Western European countries.

Nexus3 found that plastic waste often contaminates paper scraps, posing an alarming threat to the environment and health in regions such as Java or Sumatra.

Problem plastic is thrown away by paper importing companies or donated to local communities, who then engage in illegal sorting and burning of plastic.

The fires emit alarming amounts of dioxins and dangerous chemicals and eventually infiltrate human food chains.

The smoke and toxic food cause many villagers to develop respiratory and stomach diseases or even cancer and have to leave their homes.

Despite its harmful health and environmental impacts, waste trading is still seen as a highly lucrative criminal activity that flies under the radar in Southeast Asia.

According to Serena Favarin, a criminologist at Italy’s Universita Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, traffickers use sophisticated methods and supply chains to bypass controls and send waste to countries where regulations are less strict and prices for illegal waste disposal are much lower .

“This crime is not enforced in the same way in different countries, and this creates a misalignment of waste management,” she told DW.

For example, in many destination countries, waste trade regulations do not fall under criminal law, but under civil and administrative regulations.