From CBS News:
Up to 1.2 million second-hand TVs, refrigerators, washing machines, and air conditioners were estimated to have entered the Philippines between 2001 and 2005, and according to a study by Japan International Cooperation Agency and the Philippine Board of Investment, 60-70 percent of it all came from Japan.
That Japan has been sending its enormous piles of e-waste to the Philippines is not a revelation, but with the enforcement of the Japan-Philippines Economic Partnership Agreement (JPEPA), a wide-ranging bilateral trade agreement, critics fear the Philippines may essentially become Japan's dumping ground. Under JPEPA, certain hazardous waste products are allowed to enter the Philippines tax-free.
"The problem is that e-waste, under JPEPA, is considered a good," explains BAN's Gutierrez. When items are treated in economic terms as goods, then can be legally traded.
The Philippine Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) says it has made it clear to the negotiators of the agreement that if waste items -- not goods -- are coming in, the Department should control the materials under the terms of the Basel Convention, which aims to limit the trans-boundary movement of hazardous waste.
"We said, 'wastes are not goods,' so we don't trade waste, very simple. Electronic wastes are not goods," says Salvador Pace, of the DENR. But nowhere is the Basel Convention mentioned in the final agreement between Japan and the Philippines.
Japan's National Institute for Environmental Studies estimates that, on average, about 400,000 used cathode ray tube (CRT) television sets are exported from Japan to the Philippines annually. But government data show less than 800 used TVs arriving from Japan between 2006 and 2009, and only 10 in 2009.
"If we bring in lead CRTs, they are waste. Glass monitors are dinosaurs, nobody recycles the glass anymore," says Gutierrez, questioning the "goods" label assigned to the old sets.
The previous administration of Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo hailed JPEPA as a landmark agreement to boost the Philippine economy and bring more jobs to Filipinos, touting the hundreds of nurses who have gone to Japan for training and employment.
The current president, Benigno Aquino III, objected to JPEPA when he was a senator, but has said his administration will review the agreement.
"Is it really the national plan that we become a dumpsite? Is it sustainable development? When you're creating employment and investment, it shouldn't harm people," admonishes Gutierrez.
I see less of a conflict here than is implied. Even if electronic waste is a "good," I assume (but have not checked) that there is an environmental exception of some sort in the JPEPA. As suggested by the Brazil - Tyres WTO dispute, you have to be careful when implementing exceptions for these kinds of measures, but I'm fairly confident that it could be done in a way that was consistent with trade rules.
