Slashdot Mirror
Brazil Demands Repatriation of UK Hazardous Waste
Peace Corps Online writes "BBC reports that Brazilian authorities are demanding the return of more than 1,400 tons of hazardous British waste found in about 90 shipping containers on three Brazilian docks. The waste, which includes syringes, condoms, and bags of blood, has been identified as being of UK origin from the names of British supermarkets and newspapers among the rubbish. Reports in the UK media say the waste was sent from Felixstowe in eastern England to the port of Santos, near Sao Paulo, and two other ports in the southern state of Rio Grande do Sul. The British government has launched an investigation into how and why the waste was sent to Brazil and the British Embassy in Brazil has said in a statement that it was investigating and would 'not hesitate to act' if it was found that a UK company had violated the Basel Convention on the movement of hazardous waste. Meanwhile Brazil is demanding the immediate return of the rubbish to the UK. 'We will ask for the repatriation of this garbage,' says Roberto Messias, head of the Brazilian environment agency. 'Clearly, Brazil is not a big rubbish dump of the world.'" Two UK companies named by Brazil as suspected exporters of the waste are owned by a Brazilian, based in the UK, who says that anything that was in the containers other than the expected recyclable plastic is a problem to take up with his suppliers.
Why is this on Slashdot ?
Douglas Adams himself would have a difficult time thinking up something so blunderingly, amazingly stupid and steeped in political dumb-fuckery. I find myself compelled, forced even, to complete a piece of fan fiction regarding a massive garbage freighter being sent repeatedly back and forth between two planets like a giant, stinky and half-rotten tennis ball because two governments couldn't get it straight which one of them tossed out the first banana peel. I think it has merit.
The eternal struggle of good vs. evil begins within one's self.
who says that anything that was in the containers other than the expected recyclable plastic is a problem to take up with his suppliers.
Did he ship it? Did his company sign the manifests and declarations? Did his company pay the mooring fees? Sorry, that's the cost of doing business. It's his problem.
"I didn't know what was in the bag" doesn't work for smugglers.
I'm almost positive there was a Star Trek episode of that very nature... It may have been Star Trek: Voyager... does that still count?
I hear that the Port of Buenos Aires was sent 31 shipping containers of British food.
__ Someday, but not this morning, I'll finally learn to use the preview button.
This is why we should make a giant ball of garbage and shoot it into space!
syringes, condoms, bags of blood? someone had a weird party in that container.
or... perhaps the mafia was torturing someone?
Give us this day our daily mod points.
When comming from supermarkets, i believe the correct term for a bag of blood is a black pudding.
I don't know much about garbage, but 1.400 tons doesn't sound like an enormous number, considering the USA produces 220 milion tons a year.
Plus, it seems like a simple problem of foul play between companies, why does the government get involved?
I know waste disposal is a huge problem, but this sounds like attention-whoring.
oh my god... it's full of stars!
The UK should reply with: "When all Brazilians stop playing international MMO's we will.
The Mobro 4000 was a garbage barge that had to cruise back and forth between the U.S. and Central America back in the '80s.
Space game using normal deck of cards: http://BattleCards.org
You obviously didn't order the mushy peas or the "curry sauce". Tons of flavour, tho probably not to your taste.
"Welcome to our world. We are the wasted youth. And we are the future too." Yes, I know these are stupid lyrics.
Since the article does not touch on it, and the information i will be presenting IS related to technology, i will hope that my lack of account (i just don't have one) will not be too much of a hindrance.
Sending one country's waste to other countries may seem like a fluke, but in fact it's a pretty big illegal industry. PBS FRONTLINE/world did a show on how old computer and technology hardware was being sent to third world countries in bulk and outside of legal channels. For those looking for the connection to 'news for nerds' this is probably as close as you can get. The old hardware is given to recycling companies who then give it to 'other companies' which ship it to third world countries where it's essentially dumped on the poor. Think parts of India, Ghana and China. The citizenry then break/corrode/melt the materials (out of necessity) using extremely toxic and unsafe means in order to sell the various valuable pieces. Furthermore, many of the hardware pieces are still in near working order, things like harddrives specifically can still be hooked up and read accurately (at one point in the show they get a harddrive from one of the dumps and it has a whole album of family photos on it, as well as financial information).
Anyways, if anyone is interested in how this practice works and why it exists, here is the link to the story as well as the video: http://www.pbs.org/frontlineworld/stories/ghana804/
Not even something a so called "nerd", if interested, would look for to discuss on this particular website.
Lookup Asimovs Strikebreaker... there you go fixed that for you now you can sleep easy and stop whining.
Let me guess, you ate a lot of great food, drank a lot of great beer, but whatever remained that you didn't like gets called 'British food'.
It still surprises me that a country with the best restaurants and best chefs in the world, still gets judged by what people eat in the motorway transport cafes.
We need to start recycling our own waste streams rather than sending to other nations. In particular, we send our electronics to China where they pick out elements from it. Instead, if we would start designing our own recycling plants we could keep the elements HERE.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Come on, mods, I personally disagree with this opinion too, but that doesn't mean it's a troll.
All the good stuff that is being smuggled is under the yucky stuff.
This issue is a bit more complicated than you think.
pwnage will be ars.
I am open source, and Linux baby!
This is how First World countries grow and control the world, by shitting Third World countries. It's a nice article about how UK doesnt give a f*** about other countries. And this is in slashdot because they sent their waste to the "wrong" country, this happens all the time in Africans and poor Asian countries, but you just dont hear of it.
http://twitter.com/bash_history
People are talking as though the whole of the UK has got together and decided to send their shite to Brazil.
Though I don't doubt such a plan has its merits, the summary does makes it clear that it was SOME BRAZILIAN OUTFIT that perpetrated the misdeed: "We'll get rid of your waste for you. Don't worry. We have a safe place to put it."
No propblem. Let Brazil send it back, and let the Brazilians who initiated the wrongdoing take care of it.
Blame where blame is due, please. :rolls eyes:
No, your children are not the special ones. Nor are your pets.
Apparently the person who was behind this had been inspired by The Simpsons episode "Trash of the Titans"
May I suggest that next time you don't spend your time eating at chippies, greasy spoon cafes, pubs and fast food places? Try some of the good restaurants, you can find them in most towns, even those in the Fens, it just takes some effort to look them up. British food isn't just about the full English breakfast and fish and chips. They have an extensive range of foods and dishes (and heck, it even varies in style from region to region) and don't deserve tourists who can't figure out a pub from a restaurant spreading the myth than Britain has bad food.
they should send it to mexico, they never complain...
I'll admit that I ate a lot of pub food. And yes, I had the pea slurry. It was rather flavorless too. And I did have a lot of good, flavorfull food; you imported it from all over the empire. Seriously, the only place I've been with a similar selection of ethnic foods is Abu Dhabi. the best Indian cuisine I've had has been there (no, haven't been to Mumbai) Great Ethiopian and mediteranean restraunts. I mentioned a couple of Greek restraunts, I hope. Lots of good oriental food, lots. Fabulous Indian restraunts, again. Good Itallian restraunts, and some Egyptian place that didn't have the rotting smell and flies that come with everything in Cairo. However, everything that seemed local was pretty bland. Even the bangers (sausage) were pretty weak. But, I do love you guys and apologize for the oral hygine comment.
CHF 35.00 for 10 x 60 liter abfal sacks
Kanton Tessin, speaks Italian and __IS__ in Switzerland
Tm
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Poster was talking about British food. Not International-Food-that-happens-to-be-findable-in-Britain. Curry is no more British than Crepes.
Can you be Even More Awesome?!
Anyone else remember that FUTURAMA episode?
"You will perceive your children, who adore you, Neither fear to fight, nor flee from death itself." Brazilian Anthem
I'm almost positive there was a Star Trek episode of that very nature... It may have been Star Trek: Voyager... does that still count?
There was a Next Generation episode called "Final Mission" where they run into a ship full of radioactive garbage and wind up redirecting it into a star.
The person that posted the joke probably does.
Poster was talking about British food. Not International-Food-that-happens-to-be-findable-in-Britain. Curry is no more British than Crepes.
Au contraire, curry is very British, particularly if you had family who left India in '48 like me.
XML is a known as a key material required to create SMD: Software of Mass Destruction
OK, OK, let's clarify something. The UK Govt. did not send this waste to Brazil - if they had it would have ended up in Borneo, but I digress - a private company did.
Yes, there are rules about this sort of thing, but they are actually relatively difficult to enforce.
The fact is that some private company in Brazil, probably owned at least in part, by some very senior Brazilian officials, contracted to receive this waste, knowing full well what it contained. They got busted, and of course, claimed innocence.
"Medical waste, Oh, we thought it was Medical paste, WTF, send this stuff back !"
OK, who put those british supermarket bags in with the south-american waste?
politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
I'm dumbfounded by this shit and sick of the constant british bashing. There's clearly issues here. You love to mock their traditional north european stodgy food (but call it 'irish' and you're all over it, right?) , their could care less attitude towards teeth bleaching and orthodontistry, their socialist background, state run media, so called big government, cctv cameras on every single street corner or a particular sponge and treacle pudding called spotted dick. hehehe that's right it's called fucking dick. One question, when does this constant bullying start being racist?
This story clearly has nothing at all to do with tech news and everything to do with a pathetic attempt to take another swipe at a nationalty that, I can only assume, you secretly wish you were more like.
Poster was talking about British food. Not International-Food-that-happens-to-be-findable-in-Britain. Curry is no more British than Crepes.
He did not say Curry, he said "Curry Sauce", there is a difference. Curry sauce is about as related to curry is as McDonalds is to Rump steak. They might have some similar ingredients but the similarity ends there. It is certainly not an Indian creation since they have better taste.
Both curry sauce and mushy pease are strange liquids that us Brits pour over chips (thick cut French Fries but made from real potato, not reformed mash). Curry Sauce is this strange muddy brown liquid that looks disturbing like diarrea. Mushy Peas is peas that have been boiled for so long they become a textureless green slop.
In order to truly appreciate these delicacies they need to be consumed after 6 pints of strong bitter and while trying to remember where you live.
I dont read
The curry sauce I was referring to tastes more like thick warm acid than actual food. I'm pretty sure that no other country would want to claim it as part of their cuisine.
"Welcome to our world. We are the wasted youth. And we are the future too." Yes, I know these are stupid lyrics.
[Citation needed]
Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.
Sorry to spoil your anti-British rant, but the guy who owns the company that shipped that waste was Brazilian.
So maybe, just maybe, rather than this being a good excuse for you to hate the UK, the story is just about greedy fucks in general who will exploit everything they can for profit and maybe, the fact there director of the company was Brazilian is why it ended up in Brazil - because he felt his own country would be an easy target based on the first hand knowledge he has of the place and the contacts he has there.
You're right, this is how first world countries grow, but the point to take away is this - people from countries that aren't 1st world aren't saints, they're all just as bad.
the UK gov sanctioned this in a way, you need export permissions to ship this kind of waste
So just torpedo the fucking thing.
"There is much pleasure to be gained from useless knowledge." - Bertrand Russell.
The first curry recipes appeared in a British cookbook thirty years before the American wars of independence.
It's fair to say it's been here a while.
Exactly, people is the same no matter the country. But this is still happening in South American countries, the British gov wanted to send their waste there a few years ago, just by bribing local SA govs. What I'm saying is: It's just not the other way around, it's a one-way-waste-road. And I didn't meant to be anti-british, but anti 1st world-domination-policies. Hernol.-
http://twitter.com/bash_history
I can think of few attitudes more likely to indicate you are not British yourself. Curry is regarded here, as one of the most British foods you can get. What matters that it originated elsewhere. Everything in Britain did!
Aide-toi, le Ciel t'aidera - Jeanne D'Arc.
It still surprises me that a country with the best restaurants and best chefs in the world.
Is there a country that doesn't claim that?
http://www.dieblinkenlights.com
For those who want to know:
A standard 40foot long container (the ones you usually see on flatbed units in Europe) is
12m long (approx) (exact 12.192m)
2.5m high (approx) (exact 2.438m)
2.5m wide (approx) (exact 2.591m)
volume is 67.5 cubic meters
and can hold a dry max volume of 26,600kg (26.6tons)
So it would appear that someone filled up 50 odd containers with mixed non-shippable waste.
--- This meme is memory intensive
Yeah, right. The fact it shipped is proof that this is clearly NOT the case. Maybe, just maybe, the contents weren't accurately described.
.....
Hmm.. we're not allowed to ship medical waste. Maybe I'LL just describe what we're shipping, without referring to it's condition.
Shipping Manifest: 1.) Sanitary Napkins
2.) Disposable Diapers
3.) Prophylactics
4.) Hypodermic Syringes
Easy, eh ?