www.bayarea.com/mld/mercurynews/news/local/7584728.htmCan you imagine how much it would cost to recycle this crap in the USA, what with the EPA, minimum wage laws and OSHA....
NEW DELHI, India - Atul Maheshwari has something to hide. He will not permit photographs inside the high-walled courtyard of his mud-brick factory, where a half-dozen workers scurry about dipping circuit boards in and out of blue plastic drums filled with acid, stripping the boards of their last remnants of copper and traces of silver.
None of the workers wears a mask to ward off noxious fumes, and only one has thin yellow gloves to protect his skin from the toxic brew. When the acid is depleted, the men dump it into the open sewer lining a rutted dirt side-road in the Mandoli industrial area, a collection of small, decaying factories in the northeastern corner of India's capital.
Maheshwari says he ignores city regulations and burns the bare plastic boards in the open air, just like the 10 rival scrap yards doing the same work in the area. He boasts of procuring his scrap from North America, South Africa and Hong Kong, which he processes along with computer waste generated throughout India.
``If your country keeps sending us the material, our business will be good,'' he said, speaking through an interpreter.
As India emerges as a technology powerhouse, poverty, cheap labor and rampant corruption make it a prime market for the dumping and burning of unregulated electronic waste, environmental activists say. And Maheshwari's business is a stark example of this growing global industry that begins as trash in Silicon Valley and throughout the developed world and ends in India, China, the Philippines and other developing countries.
Fed largely by the discards of U.S. consumers and businesses, this burgeoning traffic in hazardous electronic waste is attracting growing scrutiny because of the pollution it causes and the danger it poses to unskilled workers overseas.