Upon Closer Inspection

Trans-boundary movements of waste are bound by provisions from international agreements. Within the European Union, the Waste Shipment Regulation (WSR) implements the various provisions and agreements related to waste shipments.

However, these rules do not automatically strengthen the principle of cross-border cooperation and enforcement, which is required to ensure effective and consistent application of the rules.

To improve compliance within the European Union, the Network for the Implementation and Enforcement of Environmental Law (IMPEL) provides an informal mechanism through which cooperation between regulators at the operational level is made possible. The IMPEL cluster for TransFrontier Shipments of Waste (TFS) is the group responsible for improving compliance with the waste shipment regulation.

The amount of waste shipped around the world is increasing. Within the European Union, as much as 15 percent of all transport movements involve waste. In developing industrial countries, like China and India, waste is considered a valuable source for raw material.

There are many legitimate recycling companies in Europe. They operate an "open door" policy and prove that waste can be sorted profitably and shipped to another country to be recycled. Conversely, there are unscrupulous companies shipping waste that can never be recycled and may represent health and environmental hazards at its final destination. This waste, even when intercepted by regulatory authorities, cannot always be easily traced back to its original source. This is often because of the number of parties involved in transboundary movements of the waste. In these cases, the original offender escapes any responsibility for the illegal shipment and non-compliance with national and international laws, and the competent authority in the country where the waste shipment originated has to cover the cost of its return and disposal.

Illegal waste movements may involve waste either wrongly described or waste shipped to countries without the required consents. Although the regulation is complex, and some illegal transports seem to be unintentional, most illegal activity appears to be the deliberate export of waste to countries that have waste import restrictions, but offer favorable commercial conditions (higher prices, lower specifications). The modus operandi of offenders in taking advantage of these opportunities varies depending on waste origin, type and destination. There is evidence that some of those involved deliberately use certain transport routes involving several different countries where enforcement activity is known to be limited.

Since 2003 the IMPEL TFS cluster has carried out several enforcement projects. The overall aim of the projects is to support effective cross-border control of waste shipments. The intention of this enforcement collaboration is to target only those waste shipments suspected of being illegal and not to disrupt the business of compliant operators. The collaborative activities involved are the exchange and sharing of information and the performance of joint inspections by regulators from several European countries.

Some obstacles and challenges still exist. Cooperation between the various involved authorities, such as environmental agencies, customs and police, is not yet routine. However it is undeniable that they need to call upon each other’s skills and experience. Sharing information between authorities at the national and international levels is also a challenge in light of the different systems used and some of the legal restrictions that constrain information sharing in some organizations.

The TFS Projects Seaport I and II were aimed at waste being shipped from major European seaports to countries outside Europe. Collaboration with customs organizations was essential in these projects, as their systems and databases hold valuable information. By joining forces, the customs officers and environmental inspectors were better able to select suspicious shipments for inspection.

The TFS Verifications projects intended to follow specific waste streams from their production to their final destination. Unfortunately it was impossible to verify the final treatment of the waste because of a lack of contacts in destination countries outside Europe.

Inspections are organized in such a way that they cause the least delay during the transport of containers. Once a container has been chosen for further investigation, an administrative check is performed. Depending on the results, a physical inspection or an X-ray scan of the load follows. Experience has indicated that the description on paper of what is in the container does not always reflect its contents. Waste may be described as non-hazardous, when, in fact, it is hazardous. Examples include scrap PCB-transformers being exported described as copper waste or household waste being exported as paper waste.

The destination stated in the paperwork may also break the rules. The destination described may be a site that does not exist, or one that is not suitable for treatment of that waste type or the address of a foreign broker, who will sell the waste to an unknown destination.

Another form of non-compliance is when wastes are exported to countries that have indicated they will not accept them. Some regulatory authorities in destination countries take a strong line with such illegal imports to their countries and will ban operators thought to be breaking the rules from importing waste to their country. Regulators may even go as far as to ban any imports that originate in a specific country where illegal shipments have been made from, thereby effecting both compliant and non-compliant traders.

It is important to note that percentages of illegal shipments found by the projects refer only to waste shipments targeted during inspection activities and not to percentages of total shipments. As long as there is a lack of accurate data on total numbers, true levels of compliance and non-compliance are difficult to determine. What is clear is that illegal waste shipments from Europe and other developed nations are resulting in increasing environmental and health problems [and] inappropriate disposal of waste or residues.

The projects have demonstrated that failure to cooperate and share information, coupled with ambiguous legislation, results in poor interpretation and inconsistent enforcement efforts.

The consequence of these problems and the low priority given to enforcement creates a gap in the regulatory cycle. This gap affects the value of policy aims and the quality of regulation and creates unfair competition for those who observe the rules.

Enforcement activity that involves monitoring and inspecting international shipments, with enforcement action when appropriate, ensures waste is managed in a way that is less likely to harm people or the environment and also provides valuable information on how regulations can be improved to make them more effective. In addition, greater dialogue between all involved in this process provides an opportunity for a better understanding of the regulations resulting in improved compliance.

A move from the current relatively low levels of enforcement activity to a much higher level of inspection and enforcement activity could reveal challenging levels of illegality. However, these challenges must be met as rising complaints from destination countries about illegal shipments and the attendant bad publicity risk undermining public confidence in recycling and its benefits.

The problem of illegal waste shipments is an international issue that can only be tackled by collaboration on an international scale. Solving the problem needs greater collaboration between the key players and their commitment to develop an effective enforcement strategy.

The author is TFS Secretariat of IMPEL and can be contacted at Nancy.Isarin@ambiendura.com. More information on IMPEL can be found at http://ec.europa.eu/environment/impel/impel_tfs.htm.