After a similar deal last year with Airtel in Ghana, Ericsson has launched an e-waste collection and awareness drive in Benin in with partnership with MTN Benin.
The deal is expected to see the two take on the 48.9 million tons problem globally. The firms have set up a collection depot with a 20-foot container at Stade de l’Amitié de Kouhounou, Cotonou, Benin. The public as well as MTN are expected to dispose their electronic waste which will then be transported to an Ericsson-approved recycling partner in Durban, South Africa.
Fredrik Jejdling, Head of Region sub-Saharan Africa, Ericsson: “ We have been partnering with our customers across the region on e-waste take back and this partnership with MTN in Benin extends the scope of this initiative to include creating awareness about e-waste and helping to ensure that end-of-life material is waste-treated in an environmentally responsible manner.”
As part of its Ecology Management Product Take-Back program, Ericsson works with its customers and the public in raising awareness and collection of e-waste, hence protecting the environment as well as the entire public from e-waste hazards.
According to the Guardian, the global volume of electronic waste is expected to grow by 33% in the next four years and in 2012 alone, nearly 50m tonnes of e-waste were generated worldwide and most of these composed of toxic substances such as lead, mercury, cadmium, arsenic and flame retardants from old mobile phones, CRT computer screens among others, toxic materials also enter the atmosphere and affect the air quality, and contaminate land and water causing a series of illness globally.
This initiative by Ericsson to curb e-waste in Africa is a move.