Indonesia is cracking down on dangerous, unwanted imports from the United States, the South China Morning Post reported, and has officially begun sending them back.
What's happening?
Officials in the port city of Batam recently exported four shipping containers of prohibited e-waste back to the U.S.
Four containers aren't many, but Indonesian officials have stressed that the shipment was the tip of the iceberg.
According to the SCMP, customs workers and inspectors with Indonesia's Ministry of Environment and Forestry discovered an unknown number of shipments "allegedly misdeclared as recyclable materials" in September.
In fact, the containers held hazardous electronic waste, or e-waste. That discovery prompted an Oct. 3 statement by Environment Minister Hanif Faisol Nurofiq.
"The government will not tolerate attempts to turn Indonesia into a dumping ground or processing site for illegal waste from overseas," Hanif vowed, per SCMP.
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Port officials said the containers, which contained computer parts, disks, and circuit boards, represented "only a small fraction" of illegal waste imports. The Post cited local media reports indicating that over 900 containers had been marked for review.
To date, "dozens" of the containers had been inspected and were "confirmed to contain illegal electronic waste," per SCMP. Batam Customs head Zaky Firmansyah said all imported e-waste would be shipped back to its country of origin — which was the U.S., in the case of the first four.
"All containers carrying hazardous and toxic waste must be reexported. There is no other option," Firmansyah stated.
Why is this concerning?
Wealthy countries have long exported the worst of their waste, particularly e-waste and plastics, in an "out of sight, out of mind" approach to consumption.
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$200 or more 💰 In 2018, China — which had long imported waste for manufacturing — banned imports of 24 categories of waste, including plastic.
In 2022, Earth.org reported that the ban had "immediate and widespread repercussions and huge problems for the global recycling industry," displacing millions of tons of plastic waste. As a result, overflow was rerouted to other countries in Southeast Asia, triggering more import bans.
Although the problem might appear to be a logistics issue at first glance, overconsumption and an increasing volume of hazardous waste were the underlying issues.
An October 2024 World Health Organization brief warned that e-waste was among the "fastest-growing solid waste streams" worldwide, with 62 million tons generated in 2022. A scant 22.3% "was documented as formally collected and recycled."
E-waste often contains toxic compounds, industrial chemicals, and hazardous heavy metals, and the general public often doesn't know that it must be disposed of properly. As a result, dangerous e-waste is routinely mixed in with household trash and sent to landfills.
Landfilled e-waste leaches those substances into the soil, air, and groundwater, contaminating them.
Moreover, single-use e-waste like disposable vapes can be volatile, with lithium-ion batteries causing fires on garbage trucks and in waste processing facilities.
What's being done about it?
In October, Hanif warned that despite enforcement challenges, Indonesia intended to prosecute offenders.
At an individual level, knowing how to properly dispose of waste, especially e-waste, can help curb the risk it poses to the planet and its inhabitants.
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