Life and Health Risks at Ghana's Agbogbloshie E-Waste Dump | Documentary Analysis

[00:00:12]they say to understand a person you have to walk a mile in their shoes so that's exactly what i'm going to do ghana is the country where my parents were born i've been to the capital accra dozens of times but this visit will be different i'm about to spend a week living and working in one of the most polluted environments on the planet ghana's notorious waste dump agbo blushy [Music] i've been told about a rubbish dump that isn't just a rubbish dump it's um something that's new to me it's an edom so it's predominantly electronic waste it's computers it's tvs rubbish that has value recycling west africa style consumer electronics smashed sorted and the valuable metals extracted this is where technology goes to die i'm heading towards a site that 80 000 people call home and where conditions are so brutal that many people die in their 20s [Music] [Applause] [Music] apparently it's one of the most toxic places on the planet they found cadmium 30 times over acceptable levels levels of lead topped 100 times it is a disaster of mammal proportions it's been alleged that the rubbish arrives in ghana from all over the world including the uk but are we complicit in creating this place and what's life like for the people who eek out are living on it [Music] agbo blossie lies on the southern edge of accra it first sprung up in the late 90s when small amounts of electrical waste started being dumped on a disused floodplain what's going on now this 20 20-acre toxic graveyard deals in everything from kettles to car parts mobile phones to fridge freezers it feels like there's just oil everywhere you can see it in the water and you can just smell it in the air i've been told to track down a team of young lads who work as burner boys the people grafting are what is considered to be the bottom of the agbo blushy ladder hello what's your name how you doing are you the chief yeah you're in charge you're the boss is he in charge they've agreed to put me up for the week in the slum and show me the ropes on the rubbish dump okay mommy who are your workers what are their names liza so how how did you all come together as a as a as a team as a workforce in five years now where did you come from because you're not from aquarium we are not we have enough from the north yes yeah my family is from well i always come to a car yes my mother's from swedero and my father's from secondly yes so i've never i've never been here before i've never seen this part of a crowd before so it's a bit of a shock to me [Music] it's snowing snowing [Applause] so am i officially part of the team now then yeah i mean and right now we need to take you to the today so that we can make the fire yes what's this this is this what you're gonna burn yes okay the burner boys provide a service cables that have been stripped out of old electrical goods can be brought to them at the edge of the site to have the plastic burned off this is proper so if i bend it or remove it and leave that and that's where the money is it's not pleasant but it's the quickest cheapest way of exposing the raw copper underneath all of these bundles they're yours yes you have to go collect this one come on and how much would this be worth a ball this size how much is this i can feed cha jam like two cd then this one turn it over yeah so the fire will enter the thing and bend it easy the heat that is coming off of that is insane and so how how many hours a day will you do this for nine nine hours nine hours you'll do it before well the heat i'm starting to get an idea of just how dangerous what i'm about to do is already like my mouth tastes funny and i'm spitting and i'm trying to get the taste out of my mouth i mean i've been in five minutes [Music] the boys are paid pennies the odd few notes are a bit of spare copper it pays just enough to buy food but rarely more my boy come on blanket be fast [Music] hang on you're burning an air conditioning tank is there copper inside that canal what is it you're using to burn there is that a fridge that fridge door the vast plumes of thick black smoke already making me feel uncomfortable it contains potentially lethal dioxins and high quantities of lead i've been told that being here for just one week i'll be fine but in the long term it could damage the nervous system attack the kidneys and ultimately cause cancer it's in your nose no you can feel it yeah it's bad you see wow yes dirty blood with only the copper remaining the bundles are taken back to the yard where they're bought up by metal traders and ultimately exported as raw materials [Music] the waste site is an assault on the senses but it's only half the story how do we cross the river over there yeah on the other side of the river a vast sprawling slum has developed so the work stays that side and this is where everybody lives officially called old fatima it's often known by a more derogatory nickname sodom and gomorrah [Music] home to some 80 000 people living within just half a square mile [Music] it has no running water or sewage system and disease is rife [Music] but for the next week i'll be staying here with 27 year old yarrow we're here yeah is this your house yeah you got a boat on top of this one yeah is that a boat yeah on top yes i make it because of water that's one way to make a room like most of the burner boys euro came from the impoverished north part of a massive influx of people lured to the capital in search of work over the past decade a practicing muslim most of his money still gets sent home but he hasn't been back for four years it's cozy yeah it's cozy in here so you're going to leave me to be here on my own i can leave you to go and stay there another room are you going to be my neighbor yeah thank you for letting me stay here i appreciate it this is where you stay with your wife or just my wife enough but i get my girlfriend in here so me and him we are sleeping yeah it's yeah friend and the wife yes you know our our type of muslim we like each other that's one way the house is fun it's warm it's nice cozy and you have children yes i have two done wow congratulations right now it's time for pray [Music] i have to make it here because i make leads for the for the mosque yes you're gonna pray in your room yes [Music] i'm a little shell-shocked it just feels like i've packed a week into a day i'm trying my hardest to take it all in but it is a lot so much so that my head's pounding a little bit now everything from the conditions to what exists just over there i mean you've got a highway over there where you've got a [ __ ] ton of people that are just driving past this i've been one of those people i've come to a car a million and one times and i don't know this garner i've got no choice but to get to know it over the next week [Music] this is clean it's dry it's safe and it's going to be home for the next week and you know what i ain't bloody complaining because this is a lot nicer than some of the places i've seen today it looks like he's put the fan together through bits and pieces he's found i mean it's so impressive i know how he's done it but i know i'm going to try and put my finger anywhere near that to turn it off i'll probably lose it [Music] although it's built on a flood plain out of wooden shacks old fatima has its own mini economy there are mosques cafes gyms and even hotels but there are no official amenities anything that does exist like toilets or showers have all been set up as small businesses i've just made a consistent amount of schoolboy errors so first of all i've bought a towel second of all i haven't really soaked so i don't know it's the smartest thing in the world to do but i've nipped a bit of our soap off the side tried to clean it as best i can but there was like an array of pubes on this thing and i think i've just about got it put free okay should we get to work yo you're working so hard every day for a purpose you're feeding your family you're feeding yourself yeah do you have a dream is there like something you're working towards in my dream small time if i get some of big money i can i can go and open a provision store you want a business that can look after itself so you don't need to do this anymore yeah how long before you get your own business before you get provision stuff let me like i have to say like two years or i want to be back in the enough the group i'm with are one of several small gangs working on the site each burner boy works with his own suppliers and how much money he makes is down to him but competition is fierce by here you take it [ __ ] people 21 year old awal sends most of his money back home to support his mother and seven-year-old son he's hoping to get enough together for them to join him and his wife he really doesn't [ __ ] about does he just gets it done you you seem to work harder than them ah you you work hard look you're sweaty look look at you sweats in the water yeah bring it put it it's still early dude it's not even lunch time yet and with the amount of coffee that's coming through here this feels like part of a chain a much bigger chain and um if the amount of men coming to these guys is anything to go by there's a lot of people doing a lot of business further inside old fatima i've been told that the burner boys are doing the hardest and most dangerous work for the smallest reward but further back up the chain there are people making money i've asked a while to introduce me to his main contact the person who sends all his wires and ultimately provides him with a living this is one man friend your name is baba twin day you see are you nigerian baba yeah i'm not i was gonna say i don't know many ghanaians called baba baba is one of agbloshi's money men the people who bring the 40 electrical items onto the site in the first place this is baba you've got so many computers yes what's the what's the business like here is it going well yeah yes it's okay so what do you do that's one way to get into it so once you crack into it you remove the boards right yes yes yes see this is copper you see this is the copper so when i when i when i finish this material i removed all this one i said for him i've been um i've been spending some time today with our yeah and um he's burning cables to get to copper to sell and he's earning a little bit how can this man how can he go from being a burner to owning a business like yours but they have their own business they they love it if they don't love it they will not they will stop it do you love it they love it do you love your job yes you love me no you've got something job so how does he graduate to another job does he need money exactly money talks he can do any other things if i have money in my pocket i can move anywhere let me let me see how much money is in your pocket no hey wow whoa hey hang on a second you've got plenty i haven't even seen one of these computer business this is where you need to be wow you guys there's always you bloody nigerians oh my god bye bye it's nice to meet you ma'am i'm sure i'll see you again yeah thank you very nice to meet you thank you okay baba specializes in computers and pays a handful of people to break down the goods he's bought into raw materials like aluminium silver and zinc nothing is left to waste but it's the copper that's most valuable come here you see the size look at the copy you're pulling out we are burning cable to get copper this much and you're just pulling out yeah fresh this size all these you see you should be working here this is where the money is so the profit on each machine that you break down will be how much in cities capacity how many machines will you break down a day 18. yeah that's not bad and if you're getting five six cities as a machine it adds up i'm not going to ask to see your wallet thank you very much okay [Music] thank you [Music] it's amazing to think that everything here was once just thrown away in agbogloshi one man's waste really is another man's treasure but for a burner boy making money is a challenge and that's if nothing goes wrong so for all of that that we burn there's only two cities yes so do you keep much money on you then when you have cash yesterday i put inside my work my wallet when you fall down you dropped it put somebody take it how much did you lose 840 000. so it's like 84 cities yes go off it boy that's a lot of that's a lot of money yes i'm starting to get more of a clearer picture as to why it's so difficult to have a different job and make better money because what i mean if you're if you're working here in this environment chances are you've not got the money to buy goods to sell at any of the other areas out here and unfortunately to avoid this you need money to start so that kind of explains why there are so many young men here you know there's young men who haven't got an education who have traveled down from the north to find money for their families and if you've got no money in your pocket this is the easiest way to earn and if you're able to save that's the easiest way to graduate to a slightly better job he was saving to try and make sure that he's not here forever and it all went tits up when he lost his bloody wallet like an idiot [Music] how much money did you make today yeah i get only three cities just three yes instead of being paid money to burn cables the boys often take a small amount of copper from their customers instead of cash it's heavy yeah it's a good bag hoping to claw back his losses a while is cashing in the stash of copper he's been saving up where's this copper for us make it 10.

[00:20:17]just give the 50. done that's it you see you see you need me thank you andy all right okay 50 cities yes 50 cities buoyed by his 53 cities or 9 pounds a while is taking me to his other business venture across the water in old fatima did you paint all of this yourself yes it's a tail as he setting up with his wife so how important is it to you then that you stop working over there burning for copper how much do you want to stop doing that it depends on [Music] hopes that his business will provide a decent living for him and his family listen you take a break let me do something after what i've seen and heard today i'm not sure how realistic that is the agbo blossie system just seems too stacked against him but you have to admire his work ethic and i think if anyone can get out it will be him [Music] it's [ __ ] tasty bro um was a good day hard day but good day my hands even hurting i can't even look skin's peeling off my hands look see good night man [Music] do you remember being a kid and um i know maybe it's just me but when i was little i was the kid that put batteries in my mouth and get told i get told off for it that weird chemical taste some of you might know what i'm talking about that weird chemical taste is what i feel like i was subjected to pretty much for the entire day i have no idea what the long-term effects of that kind of chemical and smoke inhalation actually are but i do know they can't be good [Music] literally [ __ ] sex it was a good thing i haven't got any open cuts on my hand in it how's my luck eh how is my flipping luck the work here leaves you tired scratched up burned and bruised so it's a relief not to be heading back to the site this morning today is eid the muslim festival marking the end of ramadan agbloshi is predominantly muslim and everyone in the slum has taken the day off [Music] that's one way to make an exit in it i don't think i've ever seen an imam leave on the back of my motorbike before it's pretty cool press finish yes fasting's over yes and everything's finished so what you what are your plans for ramadan then what are you going to do today we have to find somewhere so that we can make parties with all the work on the dump having stopped i'm taking the opportunity to get to know some of the boys better 22 year old razak moved here four years ago following his elder brother down from the north he'd hoped to find work as an electrician but ended up as a burner boy living in the slum with his wife and two-year-old daughter barkissu are you worried at all about the health of your child being here raising her in this environment so if she does go to school and what what do you want it to be [Music] fine because i say hopefully then you won't have to work burning copper right nice let's go i don't know like her here one [ __ ] you go all right you can't help but feel for these guys having to make a choice between bringing up their children on a toxic waste dump or sending them to live hundreds of miles away in the north it's not a decision i'd ever want to make but here it's a hard reality well this is the most action i've seen since i've been here i mean it is ramadan so everyone's out and they're celebrating and it seems like every corner i turn there's a new party happening [Music] this is turned into a night on the town with the boys in it properly you know i realize i've forgotten how old these guys actually are their husbands and their fathers as well they've got a lot of responsibilities but on a night out like tonight they're a bunch of guys in their early 20s and when you take into account what they do for a living you can understand why they want to let their hair down right coming in let's go let's go after three days i can see no one here has it easy life on agbabloshi is tough as tough as anywhere i've been anyway most muslims will be spending today celebrating with their families these boys are hundreds of miles from home but they seem to have found a bond with each other living here it must be nice to think that at least somebody is watching out for you [Music] despite their close bond the boys are trying to save enough money to move on from burning awal has been here for four years but two days ago he lost his wallet containing 84 cities precious funds he was saving towards his new tailoring business this morning though chief mohammed has spoken to the gang and they've agreed to chip in and reimburse some of his losses half half is better than nothing right so we're going to bush yes why am i pulling [Applause] armed with 90 cities or 15 pounds we're headed five miles across the city hoping to buy some scrap goods at the local electronics market and sell them for a profit back on site [Music] ghana has a well-established e-waste chain electrical items arrive here on ships from all over the world anything that is fixable is repaired and sold on anything that can't be fixed is generally bought up by wholesalers like baba and taken to agbabloshi to be scrapped awal is hoping to buy himself a piece of the action everything yes [Music] a wall has invested 40 of his 90 cities in scrap but just being here is a gamble he won't make any money today from burning and there's no guarantee that he'll be able to sell his goods back on the site mommy how much that cost 25. yeah so you still have 25 left what's he saying seven cities semi-city yeah no matter 21 our it's okay small one city there you go come on you go call me yeah thank you you know some other places to go yes having helped a while get his scrap i can't help but think where do these goods really come from in order to prevent toxic materials being transported abroad the basel convention prohibits the export of faulty electronic goods but it's common knowledge amongst locals the broken items frequently find their way into the country let us grab some they come from the uk all of it i love it and have you got any right now yeah half yeah it's a round sound yeah dvd okay this is from england where specifically is it coming from okay sound from dinner yeah okay and then uh yeah manchester can you show me do you have any yeah should i come in yeah yeah these are all from the uk what part that's that's crazy so where's this one from do you know where what shop what business because it says on the top it's faulty it's curries look at that curry's pc world okay there we go this one's faulty as well this one's been sent for return this one is an untested return again so these are all problematic that they've certainly even marked so so this is an untested return do you think these companies are aware of what's happening with their products no there's nothing to suggest these companies ever knew that these goods would end up abroad and once they sell the items onto a third party in the uk the disposal becomes the obligation of the new owner thank you for talking me through this i can't believe i've seen this here let's go the uk has strict guidelines that govern the destruction of e-waste but clearly some products are still ending up in ghana i'm actually a bit embarrassed the fact that those goods are ending up here it just doesn't make any sense to me and the reason i have such an issue with it is because i've seen what happens to those bits they end up with bubba at the computer shop and he smashes them up and then someone like oh wow comes and buys the copper and then he burns it and then he helds the fumes and he goes to the hospital it's not good enough let's go let's go back okay go back push it don't push [Music] i've got no idea if the goods on our cart are british or not but with all these money invested we start to head back home [Music] now let's go and sell it yeah let's go do you know where to go yes how much forty four fourteen i'd expected a while to break down the goods himself but there's a sort of invisible order to the waste chain here everyone has their job and i guess it's just simpler for a while to sell the goods on quickly that's good i'm just sober well done business mate we are business man by the time we've sold all the items it's almost evening today has been a gamble and for our sake i hope it's one that paid off countdown five ten 100 120 123 123 cds businessman well done [Music] i must admit i'm relieved having managed to turn a 33 city profit away is now back on track and hopefully it's enough to open the tailor shop for his wife in the slum [Music] it's a tough place man awal is doing everything he can to ensure that he's gonna be okay he stands the greatest chance of getting it it being out of this when there's desperation people will do whatever it takes to feed their families [Music] good morning yeah i woke up this morning and i'm my chest is just ropey as and i can't really attribute it to anything other than the smoke all of the boys have spoken about discomfort but yarrow seems to be suffering more than most yo breakfast this morning i'm supposed to be going with him to see the doctor where he's arranged to have one of his regular checkups okay so what is it you need to do oh i have to go so that i need to talk with my boss some of my customers they buy plenty booze correct me if i'm wrong what you're saying is you want to go and speak to someone yeah now yeah to guarantee some burning work yeah for when we come back from the hospitals where they're helping you with the results of burning yeah yeah so you want to have work to do as soon as you come back yeah yeah yeah let's go okay we'll go i'll show you that man so he's having a chat now with a guy who's one of his best customers before we go to the hospital because this guy comes maybe once or twice a year and when he comes to burn cable he's burning a huge bundle not just a small one so it's important that he secures that customer instead of somebody else getting that business [Music] this way that is the hospital little is known about the scale of health problems in adword blossom few people on the site are actually registered with a doctor all of the boys i've been working with have been breathing in toxic smoke for years what is the problem my chest and my body all is hurting okay and headache how long has he been there that has been the fever to like four months now what do you do in my work yes and i'm burning copper so do you know you know you need to cover your nose before you do it so that you don't inhale all those i know but in our work there sometimes it's good for you sometimes not for you when you cook do you bring out any flames yes sometimes the color is black are you vomiting these days last week i was spending my information can you take off your tops stand face the window any pain as to what i'm doing no no pain any pain here i've seen something okay sit down let's sit down don't put it on this thing so what we do is we do a blood test we'll take a chest x-ray and you know some of the smoke and things you are touching can bring you sickness you know not protecting yourself adequately do you know any of your colleagues working with you who coughs and that comes up yes my brother's son he's also here sure bring him over let's have a look okay doctor you were saying that you want some of his friends to come and see you as well in your opinion they should be coming more frequently there's boys that are burning yes any time they are not feeling well it's a problem and i think the minister of help will have to see how they can be organized because i believe especially the masts they need it but they will have to wear masks and then put the other potential thank you the doctor's examination has identified potential problems he's asked him to return the following day for further tests so the doctor is quite concerned something is wrong with yarn and i don't think that he's quite giving it the thought that maybe it deserves on the one hand it's easy to know how i feel about the burning it's wrong yarrow shouldn't have to breathe in toxic fumes all day just to feed his wife and kids and his mistress but at the same time they need this work to put food in their mouths it's a living but ultimately it's killing them you weren't joking about going straight back to work have you been here since the hospital yeah you finished yes i finished how much did you um how much did you burn oh look at this [Music] yeah so i have to take it with cereal it's the plan to make the money as quickly as possible that we will go to the hospital yeah they asked me about to cover myself i can't buy my own handles i have been buying anglers to protect myself and how about your nurse i wouldn't buy that my new school what was it that he said that made you want to buy the gloves you know they said that that kind of thing is crazy right now we have to change our life so that no more poisons in our body so that we can live long life what are the effects that we get it from there do you not know no one told you have you not like have you not asked until it's the first time that you've asked about the effects of the smoke yeah i don't know the effects sometimes you get awesome i get chest proof then the money that we will get take it cover yourself you should say they smoke they enter me how they smoke their antenna they enter inside my body so no matter what i'm talking you that you have to protect yourself as much as it's tickling me that yarrow has become an expert on smoke inhalation and what it might lead to i'm actually kind of over the moon that he is not only protecting himself but he's also chewing the ear off of a poor young guy about how he can actually give himself a longer life by just protecting himself while he works here if i come back in a year he might be a doctor for the entire burner boys who knows [Music] i'm relieved that the message is getting through to the boys but i hate to think what damage has been done from years spent inhaling the toxic fumes three new germany three yeah this is barcelona did you ever think that you might um you might play professionally do you ever try and train you could talk before you're at the academy really wow when did you stop because that time was my father died so do you think you'll ever go back to playing football yes if i if i get money because i want to travel if i travel i can't continue you still think there's time wifi you still think there's time to play for ghana national side do you not think what you're doing for a living now might affect your your chances in terms of your fitness if you buy that medicine and drink it it will wash every your body it's tragic to hear a wild talk about his health like this the idea that he can just get rid of all the effects of the smoke with a bit of medicine worry that unless these guys are taught about the dangers of the job nothing will ever really change [Music] okay it's my last day in the camp i feel like i've started to understand what it's like for the people who spend their lives working on the dump i'm keen to speak to someone who can tell me about why the e-waste is still arriving and whose job it is to prevent it coming in i've been told to speak to fred a local politician who speaks out on behalf of the residents of agbogloshi why is there such a problem with e-waste specifically this e-waste issue is from the western world because you don't bring it then they won't do the work and we have a clear-cut conventions and agreements why don't you respect the bazaar convention that we are not bringing that kind of waste back to this kind of developing countries so they saw the cause of this problem is the western world the united kingdom is one of them that is just of america we are going to give them a gift we are donating wastes and that is not fair because you look at their poverty aspect of it what do you think the future for for old family is i think that in as much as we know is a very bad practice and that is to stop but you have to find a solution to it before find a way you can integrate them find good work for them to survive economically the thing that keeps coming up is money though and there will always be money in scrap and we will always have scrap no matter how far we move forward as a planet there will always be waste right people have to recycle but recycle in an economic and healthy way and you think that you are doing good to them absolutely it's unacceptable absolutely unacceptable listen it's been a real pleasure meeting you fred's passionate about stamping out e-waste in akbar blushy and it's a relief to hear that at least somebody is fighting on behalf of the locals but he's right when he says you can't just get rid of it there's an established community here people depend on these jobs to survive just shutting the place down overnight might do more harm than good what is this you're burning here from fridge yes you see you cut more yeah but look at the color of the smoke it's not good [Music] hit this one huh hey [Laughter] why aren't you wearing it put it on i forget it's not please start wearing it yes look at you you're the black swan fast it's supposed to cover your nose of course [Music] hey wait wait it's hot no i need to get you some gloves next jesus christ [Laughter] jesus christ i don't really subscribe to the idea of favorites kind of a cool guy with my timer agblossy drawing to a close i built up a strong bond with the burner boys especially yarrow and a while but as i come to say my goodbyes yaro is at the hospital for more checks um listen thank you so much for having me thank you thank you for looking after me thank you thank you for feeding me as well yes and giving me somewhere to stay i appreciate you i appreciate it all right chief muhammad you're here achievement say get something to give you you have something for me what's that hey you're making me nervous what make you last last birthday to go back to your hometown hey oh what's that now copper chat reggie [Laughter] yeah look at that thank you [Music] go to the hospital i see the results yeah i get the results they say yeah they see i have blood problems and my lungs some of smoke so they need me to go and take some of medications yeah and how are you going to pay for the medicine you're going to have to go and burn yeah i'll come try and do some of work so that i can get that money to in bed yeah at least today when you work you're going to cover your nose yeah you wear some gloves a lot smoking a lot [Music] yeah i have to go okay don't worry listen please look after yourself okay okay i'm here yes okay make sure yeah cover your nose please okay look after yourself okay thank you yeah ma'am reggie [Music] my week here has been eye-opening parts of it i've genuinely loved meeting the boys and staying with them in the slum [Music] but i'm all too aware that unlike me they can't pack up their bags and walk away [Music] the burner boys came to a car in search of money and ended up stuck here they're doing a job that's probably killing them and the worst part is we're partially responsible [Music] [Applause] [Music] you