Waste pickers at the heart of the Circular Economy: a perspective from the Global South

GUTBERLET, JUTTA; CARENZO, SEBASTIAN

Bergamo

Simposio; FOURTH SYMPOSIUM ON URBAN MINING AND CIRCULAR ECONOMY; 2018

Eurowaste SRL

While the Circular Economy (CE) is discussed in the Global North as innovative approach to waste management, the idea of circular resources flows has long been central in the work of waste pickers all over the world. Waste pickers might not speak the same technical or academic language but they understand the concept of retrieving materials from the waste stream to redirecting them into the recycling economy. They can work independently or as groups involved in the collection, classification and selling of a wide range of discarded materials. These grassroots initiatives in urban mining have accumulated valuable knowledge and can offer innovative perspectives on handling waste, informed and framed by their everyday experiences with waste. Yet, their efforts are not recognized as contributions to the circular economy, nor are the daily services they provide, remunerated. Waste pickers, worldwide, are among the most excluded, most impoverished and unheard populations. Despite their precarious working and living conditions these people are part of an important workforce in the circular economy and are sometimes the most efficient linkage in the reclamation of discarded and wasted materials. The dominant Circular Economy concept currently focuses primarily on environmental and ecological sustainability outcomes but lacks the attention of social sustainability results. In order to bridge this gap, this paper proposes to consider ideas of the ecological economy (EE) and the social and solidarity economy (SSE) to further develop the concept of the CE. This means including in CE the social and political aspects of resource recovery and recycling, which have been neglected so far. Insights from empirical research in Brazil and Argentina illustrate how waste picker organizations are at the heart of the circular economy, providing selective waste collection services to communities and businesses, connecting with municipalities and industries. The paper argues that waste pickers are major protagonists in waste management and that including them in the dialogue on CE will generate new opportunities for achieving greater social and environmental justice.