What about travelling to China, for example?

[tudoremilianmarius]

Hi. Just wondering.
What if we were to travel in one of those e waste cities from the documentaries? Fill a container, ship it, process it.
How bad of an idea does this sound?

 

[jarlowski1]

I don't think the government of such countries would allow a non citizen or "tourist" permission to do something like that. In some countries it maybe considered illegal and to the extreme you could be jailed or worse. One would have to speak to the government officials of the country one wants to do this in.

 

[tudoremilianmarius]

I agree with that. I've seen a video of a journalist getting in trouble with the local authorities/local gangsters in that Chinese e waste city. But then again, he wasn't there for business purposes. He was investigating.
Let's assume you would eventually find your way around, financially speaking, it would make sense.
A container full of computers and motherboards should have a considerable value.
And it's not just in China. It's India, Africa. Lots of places with tons of e waste.
I'm wondering if it would it be legal to import such thing to Europe.

 

[timsiggins]

This seem counter productive don't we export all the e-waste to china and India, why are not processing the valuable stuff here and sending the rest

 

[justinhcase]

The reason some parts of the world attracts such toxic and laborious work is because the local economy is so poor that they are willing to sacrifice the health of their own children for a day's food.
They live in such poverty that they have no choice, eat today and worry about next year if you live that long.
I would travel to help them clean up their act.
But going there to diminish an already poor economy by earning money would be futile and immoral.