Title: ELECTRONIC WASTE RECYCLING CHALLENGES IN AFRICA : SYMBOLIC OF DEVELOPING COUNTRIES SITUATION

Abstract:

Waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE), electronic waste or e‐waste, electronic scrap or e‐scrap, and end‐of‐life (EoL) electronic devices are synonyms used to describe discarded or obsolete electrical or electronic devices. E‐waste represents the dark side of  information communication technology (ICT) revolution that has transformed modern living, international business, global governance, communication, entertainment, transport, education, and health care with fast communication gadgets, such as personal computers and mobile phones. It is hazardous wastes according to the Basel Convention on the control of transboundary of hazardous waste because it contains hazardous substances such as heavy metals like Pb; Cd; Hg; etc and persistent organic pollutants (POPs) such as brominated flame retardants. E-waste also contains precious metals such as gold; silver; palladium etc thus depicting a sweet and sour story. Increasing demand for electrical electronic equipment (EEE) and used EEE(UEEE) towards bridging the digital gap is exacerbated by dumping e-waste majorly from developed countries in North America and Europe as well as China.

In the general absence of standard waste management systems and practices in Africa e-waste management has become a major challenge for governments and policy makers as legislation and enforcement is rare, and unregulated repair and reuse, together with crude and dangerous recycling practices and informal sector activities entailing uncontrolled dumping of e-waste in dumpsites/landfills; uncontrolled open burning contributing to the release of dioxins and furans as well as green house gases emission; and acid leaching of wastes predominate with potential harm to the environment and threat to human health. The absence of infrastructure for the appropriate collection and  recycling of WEEE and legislation dealing specifically with WEEE  are some of the additional challenges facing Africa.

The adoption of extended producer responsibility (EPR) within a circular economy seem to be an appropriate model for profitable e-waste recycling operations in Africa. A $15 million circular electronics initiative in Lagos , Nigeria was launched recently by the Nigerian Government, the Global Environment Facility (GEF) and UN Environment as a pilot project that would lead to great investments in e-waste recycling infrastructure.

Biography:

Professor Oladele Osibanjo has a PhD degree in Analytical Chemistry from the University of Birmingham , Edgbaston, United Kingdom in 1976. He won the Elwell Award also in 1976 of the Royal Society of Chemistry; Midlands Region; United Kingdom for contribution to the development of analytical chemistry. He was a Professor of Analytical and Environmental Chemistry at the University of Ibadan, Nigeria’s premier university until retirement in December 2015 from the institution. He was the pioneer Executive Director, since inception in 1994; of the Basel Convention Coordinating Centre for Training and Technological Transfer for the Africa Region (BCCC--Africa in Nigeria) on Hazardous Waste and Toxic Chemicals Management. BCCC--Africa in Nigeria is a Federal Ministry of Environment – University of Ibadan Linkage Centre and Federal Ministry of Environment/ GEF/UNIDO designated Regional Geo-environmental Centre, until his retirement in early 2016. .

Title: Supply Chain and Inventory management practices being followed in Relief Operations

Abstract:

The supply chain management is defined as the set of processes to deliver the service or product to the ultimate customer in an efficient manner so that it can optimize the time, resources and cost of the operation. Though, we are living in the environment of unpredicted incidents i.e. natural or man-made. Therefore, there should be some supply chain mechanism to handle such situations. In this direction, the humanitarian relief chain (HRC) which covers all the relief operations similar to the supply chain. In the HRC each and every process is important and mandatory to complete in a sort period of time. The processes are performed to ensure the distribution of relief commodity to the ultimate beneficiary. Furthermore, to ensure the delivery of relief commodities there is need of inventory to fulfill the requirement of relief centers. Hence the inventory management plays a vital role to accomplish the HRC. This talk will discuss a comprehensive study about the supply chain and inventory management practices being followed in the area of HRC. This discussion has greater potential for the researcher to explore the research field of HRC. Thus, this is going to be helpful for academicians and researchers to go through in the research direction.

Title: The potential benefits and implications of wastewater reuse for irrigation on the agricultural environment

Abstract:

Plethora of urban escalation owing to irrational wastewater disposal methods and practices in recent decades have resulted in severe environmental issues like degrading river quality, ground water pollution, heavy metal contamination, deterioration in soil health and nearby water reservoir quality etc. Apart from all harmful constituents, it also has essential macronutrient for soil and plants growth. The erratic nature of wastewater generation and flow makes it expensive to use for physical and chemical treatment and difficult to use for biological removal. In this view untreated wastewater utilization in agriculture is a sustainable way with multifaceted benefits of wastewater management, reduction in contamination, curtailment in use of inorganic fertilizer. Application of wastewater up to certain concentration in irrigation serves several goals such as promoting sustainable agriculture in arid and semiarid region, preserving scare water resources, and maintaining environmental quality. This could reduce the application of synthetic fertilizer drastically and benefit the farmers in the future prospects. Therefore, cautious use of wastewater can be an environmentally and economically sustainable alternative to chemical fertilizers for improving crop productivity, crop yield and at the same time, help in treating wastewater as a valuable resource.

Biography:

Dr. Rajeev Pratap Singh is an Assistant Professor at the Institute of Environment and Sustainable Development (IESD), Banaras Hindu University, India. He completed his Ph.D. at the same University. His main research interests include solid waste management, bio-composting, and green technologies. He has received several international awards, including the “Green Talent” award from the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), Germany; Prosper.Net Scopus Young Scientist award, DST Young Scientist Award, etc. Dr. Singh is a member of reviewer and editorial team of several important scientific journals and has edited 5 books and 50 highly cited research and review articles on solid waste management and ecotoxicology. Dr Singh’s research works are very well cited by researchers globally (Google Scholar citation 3,136; h-index 22; and i10-index 31). Dr. Singh also received Water Advanced Research and Innovation (WARI) Fellowship from DST, Govt. of India, IUSSTF, University of Nebraska-Lincoln (UNL), and the Robert Daugherty Water for Food Institute (DWFI).

Title: Mitigating approaches in plastic waste management

Abstract:

While global capacity of plastic production continues to escalate, recovery of waste seems to be heading into a deadlock¹. Petrochemicals are making use of all resources in order to remain on a business-as-usual approach trying to put blame on consumer malpractices and inefficient collecting schemes to steer away from environmental impact caused by plastic littering spreading all over the Earth³. Lack of proper waste management policies in place is raising / arousing deep concern by governments and public as disposed waste, incineration  and littering offsets by large the amount which is efficiently recycled. Recent surveys carried out in the UK points out to the complexities and confusion over plastics recycling whilst Europe and North America faces the consequences of the embargo of plastic waste shipping to Asia and Africa³. It seems that the problem goes much beyond basic understanding of inherent complexities stemmed from polymer chemistry itself and formulation of plastics as a whole⁴. The Resin Identification Code (RIC) which is mostly used for recycling purposes is currently under review by ASTM, as it does not seem to handle any longer the myriad of plastic products which hit the market with multiple functionalities and even more challenging recycling capabilities requirements. The manufacturing of plastics in part or in total from renewable sources and at the same time making biodegradable or compostable plastics to tackle single-use applications has also presented some hurdles in terms of consumer education and waste management⁵. On the side of bioplastics from renewable sources, the inception of Green Polyethylene by Braskem in Brazil using sugarcane ethanol is a cradle-to-gate solution which still relies in waste separation and recycling to be fully sustainable. The compostable bioplastics market in Brazil remains rather sluggish after unsuccessful attempts to produce PHB resins in a local plant. As though, many questions have been raised in regard to the bioplastics as being a sustainable alternative for replacement of petrochemical plastics, particularly in single-use, consumer applications. Our research has many unanswered questions which lie on public perception and awareness of compostable plastics benefits over regular plastics, recycling issues and last, but not least importantly the current status of waste management of compostable bioplastics, such as PLA, PHB and Thermoplastic Starch blends. The present paper is mostly intended to discuss the inherent complexities associated with each class of plastic product based upon their polymer chemistry and chemical additives in the formulation in an attempt to forward waste mitigation approaches and at same time review new technology pathways based on waste-to-energy and recovery of polymer basic constituents and monomers by purification and depolimerization⁶. Furthermore the crossroads faced by renewable sources and compostable solutions needs tremendous investment in environmental education once they cannot solve the problem of waste without an investment strategy.  Our focus is to highlight the urgent issues and outline short to long term solutions to cope with the complexity of public understanding with a system approach involving all parties, including getting retail suppliers in the process.

Biography:

Carlos Alberto Correa is a Senior Visiting Professor at Federal University at ABC (UFABC), in the State of Sao Paulo, Brazil. He is also an Associated Professor at the Centre for Engineering, Modelling and Applied Social Sciences and Researcher at the Strategic Nuclei for Waste Revaluation - REVALORES. Carlos has a bachelor degree in Materials Engineering specialized in polymer materials and a PhD in Advanced Materials from Cranfield University in the UK. He has solid academic and industrial expertise in plastics, polymer blends and biocomposites. He has led a long term international cooperation Brazil/Canada on plastics recycling and renewably sourced materials with partnering industries and academia. Current research interests are management of plastic waste, mechanical and chemical recycling, biodegradable and compostable plastics and biocomposites.