NESREA to sanction irresponsible disposal of electronic waste

By Okwy Iroegbu-Chikezie

The Director General/Chief Executive, National Environmental Standards and Regulations Enforcement Agency (NESREA),Prof Aliyu Jauro, has warned of sanctions against producers that refuse to collect and safely dispose their electrical and electronic equipment.

Jauro, who was addressing a building programme for enforcement officers and value chain for extender producer responsibility(EPR) in Lagos said electronics are becoming an increasing challenge for the waste system and that the agency wants to enforce regulations that will keep them out of landfills.

He said NESREA is promoting the reuse and refurbishment of products to reduce the amount of waste produced by electronics. This has come against the backdrop of Nigeria having a poor record in recycling e-waste despite being one of its largest producers.

He said the government is tacking recycles 300,000 tonnes of e-waste.

According to him, the realities of climate change was affecting the economy thorough chemical emissions, adding that recycling e-waste is something local manufacturers must all do contribute to the nation’s sustainable future.

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As a pioneer of, EPR in Africa, Jauro said the agency is determined to develop and implement benchmark metrics to measure industry performance and regulatory compliance, electronic producers and manufacturers in meeting their obligations throughout the country.

He stressed that a circular economy is the only way to ensure old resources are fed back into the system and are used as raw materials when manufacturing new ones.

To ensure effectiveness of e-waste management efforts and to meet desired targets, he added that the government will need strong support from all the stakeholders in the value chain,adding that the ongoing awareness initiative is meant to change the consumer mindset to build a more sustainable ecosystem for collection and management of end of life (EOL) products.

He said the agency decided to hold the programme in Lagos since the ports generates the greatest amount of electronic waste,adding that there was need to enlighten value chain players to adopt measure to manage collect and disposal.

The Standards Organisation Of Nigeria(SON) Consults Director, Dr. Justin Nickaf said the organisation supports NESREA in its effort to strengthen EPR, which is the global best practice to ensure the take-back of the end-of-life products. He said there was a need for rules to govern the disposal of used and defunct electronics, requring e-waste to be collected, transported and safely disposed.

According to him, the bulk of e-waste is handled by the informal or unregulated sector.

He said the major challenge improving the effectiveness of e-waste management and reducing associated environmental and health risks in cities and communities. This,he added, required, finding ways to increase the responsible disposal of e-waste by producers and users, improve recycling practices and methods of informal sector processors, and enable technologies that are cost effective and have capacity to process large volumes of waste.