
A waste picker also known as waste collector or garbage collector is a person who salvages reusable or
recyclable materials thrown away by others to sell or for personal consumption.
There are millions of waste pickers worldwide, predominantly in
developing countries
A developing country is a sovereign state with a less-developed Secondary sector of the economy, industrial base and a lower Human Development Index (HDI) relative to developed countries. However, this definition is not universally agreed upon. ...
, but increasingly in
post-industrial countries as well.
Various forms of waste picking have been practiced since antiquity, but modern traditions of waste picking took root during
industrialization
Industrialisation (British English, UK) American and British English spelling differences, or industrialization (American English, US) is the period of social and economic change that transforms a human group from an agrarian society into an i ...
in the nineteenth century.
Over the past half-century, waste picking has expanded vastly in the developing world due to
urbanization
Urbanization (or urbanisation in British English) is the population shift from Rural area, rural to urban areas, the corresponding decrease in the proportion of people living in rural areas, and the ways in which societies adapt to this change. ...
,
toxic colonialism and the
global waste trade.
Many cities only provide solid waste collection.
Terminology
Many terms are used to refer to people who salvage recyclables from the waste stream for sale or personal consumption. In English, these terms include ''rag picker'', ''reclaimer'', ''informal resource recoverer'', ''litter picker'', ''recycler'', ''poacher'', ''salvager'', ''scavenger'', and ''waste picker''; in Spanish , , , , and ; and in Portuguese .
A more contemporary term, focusing on the outcome of the professional activity, is "informal sector recycling". However, the word "informal" can be partly misleading, because in practice a continuum between total informality and proper organization in taxed registered formal activities may be encountered.
In 2008, participants of the First World Conference of Waste Pickers chose to use the term "waste picker" for English usage to facilitate global communication. The term "scavenger" is also commonly used, but many waste pickers find it demeaning due to the implied comparison with animals.
A waste picker is different from a
waste collector because the waste collected by the latter may be destined for a
landfill
A landfill is a site for the disposal of waste materials. It is the oldest and most common form of waste disposal, although the systematic burial of waste with daily, intermediate and final covers only began in the 1940s. In the past, waste was ...
or
incinerator
Incineration is a list of solid waste treatment technologies, waste treatment process that involves the combustion of substances contained in waste materials. Industrial plants for waste incineration are commonly referred to as waste-to-ene ...
, not necessarily for a recycling facility.
"
Dumpster diving
Dumpster diving (also totting, skipping, skip diving or skip salvage) is wikt:salvage, salvaging from large commercial, residential, industrial and construction containers for unwanted items discarded by their owners but deemed useful to the ...
" generally refers to the practice of
anti-consumer and
freegan activists who reclaim items such as food and clothes from the waste stream as a form of protest against
consumer culture. "Waste picking" generally refers to activity motivated purely by economic need.
Prevalence and demographics
There is little reliable data about the number and demographics of waste pickers worldwide. Most academic research on waste pickers is qualitative rather than quantitative. Systematic large-scale data collection is difficult due to the profession's informal nature, porous borders, seasonally fluctuating workforce, and widely dispersed and mobile worksites. Also, many researchers are reluctant to produce quantitative data out of fear that it might be used to justify crackdowns on waste picking by authorities. Thus, the large-scale estimates that do exist are mainly extrapolations based on very small original research samples.
In his book, "The World's Scavengers" (2007), Martin Medina provides a methodological guide to researching waste picking.
In 1988, the
World Bank
The World Bank is an international financial institution that provides loans and Grant (money), grants to the governments of Least developed countries, low- and Developing country, middle-income countries for the purposes of economic development ...
estimated that 1–2% of the global population subsists by waste picking. A 2010 study estimates that there are 1.5 million waste pickers in India alone. Brazil, the country that collects the most robust official statistics on waste pickers, estimates that nearly a quarter million of its citizens engage in waste picking.
Waste picker incomes vary vastly by location, form of work, and gender. Some waste pickers live in extreme poverty, but many others earn multiple times their country's minimum wage. Recent studies indicate that waste pickers in
Belgrade
Belgrade is the Capital city, capital and List of cities in Serbia, largest city of Serbia. It is located at the confluence of the Sava and Danube rivers and at the crossroads of the Pannonian Basin, Pannonian Plain and the Balkan Peninsula. T ...
,
Serbia
, image_flag = Flag of Serbia.svg
, national_motto =
, image_coat = Coat of arms of Serbia.svg
, national_anthem = ()
, image_map =
, map_caption = Location of Serbia (gree ...
, earn approximately US$3 per day,
while waste pickers in Cambodia typically earn $1 per day.
Official statistics in Brazil indicate that men earn more than women, regardless of age. Approximately two-thirds of Brazil's waste pickers are men overall, but this proportion jumps to 98% in high income waste picker groups (those earning between 3–4 times the
minimum wage
A minimum wage is the lowest remuneration that employers can legally pay their employees—the price floor below which employees may not sell their labor. List of countries by minimum wage, Most countries had introduced minimum wage legislation b ...
). No women were found in the highest income groups (those earning over 10 times the minimum wage).
Causes
In developing countries

Over the past half century, in-country migration and increased fertility rates have caused the population of cities in the developing world to mushroom. The global population of urban dwellers is expected to double between 1987 and 2015, with 90% of this growth occurring in developing countries.
Much of the new population has settled in urban
slum
A slum is a highly populated Urban area, urban residential area consisting of densely packed housing units of weak build quality and often associated with poverty. The infrastructure in slums is often deteriorated or incomplete, and they are p ...
s and squatter settlements, which have expanded rapidly with no central planning. The
United Nations Habitat Report found that nearly one billion people worldwide live in slums, about a third of the world's urban dwellers.
The rapid urbanization greatly increased the demand for informal waste collecting services, as cities lacked the infrastructure and resources to collect the totality of wastes generated by their inhabitants. Despite spending 30–50% of operation budgets on waste management, developing world cities today collect only 50–80% of refuse generated by inhabitants. Residents and businesses often resort to burning garbage or disposing of it in streets, rivers, vacant lots, and
open dumps.
This is a source of air, land, and water pollution that threatens human health and the environment. Informal waste collectors help mitigate this harm by collecting recyclable materials by foot or in pushcarts, tricycles, donkey carts, horse carts, and pickup trucks.
On the supply side, urbanization has facilitated the expansion of waste picking by creating a large pool of unemployed and underemployed residents with few alternative means of earning a livelihood. Known as "the one industry that is always hiring", waste picking provides a cushion for many who lose their jobs during times of war, crisis, and economic downturn in countries that do not have welfare systems. It is also one of the few work opportunities available to people who lack formal education or job experience.
In post-industrial countries
Though documentation exists of
rag pickers and
scrap metal
Scrap consists of recyclable materials, usually metals, left over from product manufacturing and consumption, such as parts of vehicles, building supplies, and surplus materials. Unlike waste, scrap can have monetary value, especially recover ...
collectors supplying goods to
paper mills and
foundries as early as the 17th century, modern waste picking did not flourish in the US and Europe until the 19th century.
Just as in the developing world, the combination of
industrialization
Industrialisation (British English, UK) American and British English spelling differences, or industrialization (American English, US) is the period of social and economic change that transforms a human group from an agrarian society into an i ...
and
urbanization
Urbanization (or urbanisation in British English) is the population shift from Rural area, rural to urban areas, the corresponding decrease in the proportion of people living in rural areas, and the ways in which societies adapt to this change. ...
led to three trends which favored the blossoming of the informal waste collecting industry: increased generation of urban waste, increased demand for raw materials from industry, and increased numbers of urban dwellers in need of livelihoods. In that era, waste pickers were known as wharf rats, tinkers,
rag and bone men,
mudlarks, and ragpickers. By the mid-20th century waste picking decreased, as waste management industries were formalized, and welfare states decreased the poor's reliance on informal recycling.
Beginning in the mid-1990s, however, informal recycling in parts of the United States and Western Europe once again began to mushroom. Two factors fueled the boom: First, the demand for recycling surged due to the increased waste stream, declining room in
landfill
A landfill is a site for the disposal of waste materials. It is the oldest and most common form of waste disposal, although the systematic burial of waste with daily, intermediate and final covers only began in the 1940s. In the past, waste was ...
s, new recycling technologies, and the efforts of
environmentalists
Environmentalism is a broad philosophy, ideology, and social movement about supporting life, habitats, and surroundings. While environmentalism focuses more on the environmental and nature-related aspects of green ideology and politics, ecologi ...
.
In 1985 only one roadside recycling program existed in the United States. By 1998, there were 9,000 such programs and 12,000 recyclable drop-off centers. Laws were passed in some states making it illegal not to recycle. Second, changes in the political economy including the loss of manufacturing jobs, cutbacks to government employment, and the roll back of the welfare state increased the ranks of the poor, working poor, and homeless—thus there were more people disposed to wastepick as a full-time profession or supplemental job.
American waste pickers predominantly collect cans, bottles, and cardboard.
Many immigrants work as waste pickers because language and documentation barriers limit their opportunities to work elsewhere. Many homeless people also work as waste pickers—some describe it as their only alternative to
panhandling.
Some recyclers use vans to increase their yield while others work on foot with carts. Anecdotal evidence suggests that most American waste pickers are male, as waste picking is widely considered too dirty and strenuous a job for women. During an
ethnography
Ethnography is a branch of anthropology and the systematic study of individual cultures. It explores cultural phenomena from the point of view of the subject of the study. Ethnography is also a type of social research that involves examining ...
of homeless recyclers in
San Francisco
San Francisco, officially the City and County of San Francisco, is a commercial, Financial District, San Francisco, financial, and Culture of San Francisco, cultural center of Northern California. With a population of 827,526 residents as of ...
,
sociologist Teresa Gowan claims to have met hundreds of male waste pickers, but only four female waste pickers.
Costs and benefits
Social and ecological benefits

Waste picking offers significant ecological, economic, and social benefits:
* Job creation: Waste picking provides a source of livelihood to extremely poor people with few other employment opportunities. Though many waste pickers practice their trade as a full-time profession, its flexible hours make it accessible to women with other care responsibilities and to people looking to supplement income from other jobs. During times of need, waste picking serves as a safety net to street children, orphans, the elderly, widows, migrants, the disabled, the unemployed, and victims of armed conflicts. Waste picking also benefits the broader economy by supplying raw materials to industry and creating many associated jobs for middlemen who purchase, sort, process, and resell materials collected by waste pickers.
* Public health and sanitation: Waste pickers collect garbage from neighborhoods that lack public services. Without waste pickers, residents would be forced to burn trash, or dispose of it in rivers, streets and empty lots. Waste pickers provide the only solid waste removal service in many cities.
* Municipal savings: Waste pickers provide between 50 and 100% of waste collecting services in most cities of the developing world, according to a 2010
UN Habitat report. This effectively serves as a mass subsidy for city governments, who do not pay for the labor. Moreover, recycling expands the lifespan of city dumps and landfills.
* Reducing pollution and
mitigating climate change: By cutting the quantity of virgin materials needed for production, waste pickers save room in landfills, lessen water and energy consumption, reduce air and water pollution, and abate climate change.
Since 2009, international delegations of waste pickers have attended at least five global climate change conferences to demand that climate funds invest in
resource recovery programs that will help ensure waste pickers' livelihoods, rather than waste disposal technologies like
incinerators.
Social costs
Waste pickers not only generate social benefits, but also potential costs as well. These include:
* Occupational hazards: See discussion below.
*
Child labor
Child labour is the exploitation of children through any form of work that interferes with their ability to attend regular school, or is mentally, physically, socially and morally harmful. Such exploitation is prohibited by legislation w ...
: Children commonly work as waste pickers. This may interfere with their education, or harm their physical, emotional, and social well-being.
* Litter: Waste pickers working on streets sometimes spread waste from trash bags, sullying the sidewalk and creating more work for city street sweepers.
* Public nuisance: Many people view waste pickers as a nuisance or source of shame for their communities. Waste pickers' perceived poverty and lack of sanitation makes some people uncomfortable or fearful. In developing countries especially, many argue that modern services should replace waste pickers.
* Pilfering of public property: In some cities, waste pickers have been known to steal, melt down, and resell public property such as telephone and electrical copper wire, steel fencing, or manhole covers.
Occupational hazards
Health risks
There is a high prevalence of disease among waste pickers due to their exposure to hazardous materials such as fecal matter, paper saturated by toxic materials, bottles and containers with chemical residues, contaminated needles, and
heavy metals
upright=1.2, Crystals of lead.html" ;"title="osmium, a heavy metal nearly twice as dense as lead">osmium, a heavy metal nearly twice as dense as lead
Heavy metals is a controversial and ambiguous term for metallic elements with relatively h ...
from batteries.
A study in
Mexico City
Mexico City is the capital city, capital and List of cities in Mexico, largest city of Mexico, as well as the List of North American cities by population, most populous city in North America. It is one of the most important cultural and finan ...
found the average lifespan of a dumpsite waste collector to be 39 years, compared to the national average of 69 years, though a later World Bank study estimated life span to be 53 years. In
Port Said
Port Said ( , , ) is a port city that lies in the northeast Egypt extending about along the coast of the Mediterranean Sea, straddling the west bank of the northern mouth of the Suez Canal. The city is the capital city, capital of the Port S ...
, Egypt, a 1981 study showed an
infant mortality rate of 1/3 among waste pickers (one out of three babies dies before reaching age one).
Risks of injury
Among the most common types of job-related injuries for waste pickers are back and hand injuries caused by lifting heavy objects with little equipment. In a study of 48 waste pickers in Santo André, Brazil, almost all workers reported pain in the back, legs, shoulder, arms, and hands. Waste pickers who work in open dumps are exposed to large amounts of toxic fumes, and face other severe threats including being run over by trucks and caught in surface subsidence, trash slides, and fires.
On 10 July 2000, several hundred waste pickers were killed by a trash slide from a huge garbage mountain after monsoon rains at an open dump in
Payatas,
Philippines
The Philippines, officially the Republic of the Philippines, is an Archipelagic state, archipelagic country in Southeast Asia. Located in the western Pacific Ocean, it consists of List of islands of the Philippines, 7,641 islands, with a tot ...
.
Stigma, harassment, and violence
Most waste picking activity is illegal or unpermitted, so waste pickers commonly face harassment by police and authorities.
Also, there is widespread public scorn against waste pickers due to their poverty and perceived lack of hygiene. Women are subject to greater harassment, particularly sexual harassment due to their low social status and lack of social support.
One of the most extreme manifestations of such stigma occurs in
Colombia
Colombia, officially the Republic of Colombia, is a country primarily located in South America with Insular region of Colombia, insular regions in North America. The Colombian mainland is bordered by the Caribbean Sea to the north, Venezuel ...
, where, since the 1980s, "
social cleansing" vigilante groups, sometimes working with police complicity, have killed at least two thousand waste collectors, beggars, and prostitutes—whom they refer to as "disposables" (''desechables''). In 1992, around the peak of this activity, eleven corpses of murdered waste collectors were discovered at a university in
Barranquilla
Barranquilla () is the capital district of the Atlántico department in Colombia. It is located near the Caribbean Sea and is the largest city and third port in the Caribbean region of Colombia, Caribbean coast region; as of 2018, it had a popul ...
. Their organs had been sold for transplants and bodies sold to the medical school for dissection (Medina 2009, 155).
Waste picker organizing
Traditionally, scholars assumed that informal workers such as waste pickers could not collectively organize due to structural barriers such as lack of legal protection, widely dispersed worksites, porous borders to their profession, a culture of independence and individualism, lack of institutional experience, and lack of money and time to build organizations. Nonetheless, in recent decades waste pickers across Latin America, Asia, and Africa have begun collectively organizing to win a place within formal recycling systems.
Waste pickers use many organizational formats including cooperatives, associations, companies, unions, and micro-enterprises. Despite the differences in format, most of these organizations share three primary purposes. First, by pooling capital, establishing microenterprises, and forming partnerships with business and government, waste collectors increase their selling power. Second, by securing uniforms, safety equipment, and work permits, cooperatives increase workplace dignity and safety. And third, by demanding recognition and compensation from the state for their environmental and economic contributions, cooperatives increase members' political might. These three functions—political influence, workplace dignity and safety, and increased earnings—are mutually reinforcing, like legs on a stool.
Some waste pickers have created "women's only" organizations, which seek to combat gender-based discrimination at worksites and in communities. A study in Brazil indicates that women are heavily overrepresented even in coed organizations, making up 56% of the membership despite the fact that they represent only a third of the total waste picking population.
Beginning in the 1990s, waste picker organizations in many parts of the world began uniting into regional, national, and transnational coalitions to increase their political voice and economic leverage. In March 2008, delegates from 30 countries gathered in
Bogotá
Bogotá (, also , , ), officially Bogotá, Distrito Capital, abbreviated Bogotá, D.C., and formerly known as Santa Fe de Bogotá (; ) during the Spanish Imperial period and between 1991 and 2000, is the capital city, capital and largest city ...
, Colombia, for the first World Conference (and Third Latin American Conference) of Waste Pickers (WIEGO 2008). One of the key issues discussed was the global trend of privatization and concentration of waste management systems. Normally, privatization is thought of as the handover of government functions to the private sector, but in this case, privatization often means the transference of services formerly provided by informal waste collectors to private firms.
As waste streams have expanded due to increased consumption, the waste management industry is becoming increasingly lucrative. Governments around the world are granting private companies monopolies on waste management systems, meaning that the cooperatives' survival hinges on building political and economic alliances needed to win contracts—often an uphill battle given authorities' distrust of waste collectors and the cooperatives' lack of capital for modern machinery.
Organizing in Latin America
In 1962, the first known
Latin America
Latin America is the cultural region of the Americas where Romance languages are predominantly spoken, primarily Spanish language, Spanish and Portuguese language, Portuguese. Latin America is defined according to cultural identity, not geogr ...
n waste picker's organization, ''Cooperativa Antioqueña de Recolectores de Subproductos'', was created in
Medellín
Medellín ( ; or ), officially the Special District of Science, Technology and Innovation of Medellín (), is the List of cities in Colombia, second-largest city in Colombia after Bogotá, and the capital of the department of Antioquia Departme ...
, Colombia. The Colombian waste pickers movement did not emerge as a veritable political force until 1990, however, when four cooperatives who had been fighting the closure of a landfill united as the Waste Collector's Association of Bogotá (''Asociación de Recicladores de Bogotá'', ARB). Today the ARB is one of the world's most active and established waste picker organizations. In 2013, the
Goldman Environmental Prize
The Goldman Environmental Prize is a prize awarded annually to grassroots environmental activists.
History
Awardees are named from each of the world's six geographic regions: Africa, Asia, Europe, Islands and Island Nations, North America, an ...
was awarded to
Nohra Padilla (representing the ARB) for her contribution to
waste management
Waste management or waste disposal includes the processes and actions required to manage waste from its inception to its final disposal. This includes the collection, transport, treatment, and disposal of waste, together with monitor ...
and
recycling
Recycling is the process of converting waste materials into new materials and objects. This concept often includes the recovery of energy from waste materials. The recyclability of a material depends on its ability to reacquire the propert ...
in Colombia. Throughout the 1990s, powerful waste collectors associations began to form in other Latin American countries as well—most notably in Brazil, Argentina, Chile, and Uruguay.
In 2005,
Brazil
Brazil, officially the Federative Republic of Brazil, is the largest country in South America. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by area, fifth-largest country by area and the List of countries and dependencies by population ...
hosted the first meeting of the Latin American Waste Picker Network (LAWPN)—an organization that now represents waste pickers movements from 16 countries. LAWPN has four key functions. First, it facilitates exchanges of knowledge, technology, and strategies between member organizations through regional conventions, country-to-country delegations, telecommunications, and strategic reports. Second, it organizes transnational solidarity to aid in local battles. For example, when waste pickers in
Montevideo
Montevideo (, ; ) is the capital city, capital and List of cities in Uruguay, largest city of Uruguay. According to the 2023 census, the city proper has a population of 1,302,954 (about 37.2% of the country's total population) in an area of . M ...
,
Uruguay
Uruguay, officially the Oriental Republic of Uruguay, is a country in South America. It shares borders with Argentina to its west and southwest and Brazil to its north and northeast, while bordering the Río de la Plata to the south and the A ...
, needed support in a local campaign, member organizations across Latin America issued solidarity statements and pressured their national ambassadors in Uruguay to do the same. Third, LAWPN sends leaders from countries with strong waste picker movements to countries with weak movements in order to promote the development of new leadership and organizations. Fourth, LAWPN organizes global waste picker committees to make appeals for support to transnational governance organizations such as the
Inter-American Development Bank
The Inter-American Development Bank (IDB or IADB) is an international development finance institution headquartered in Washington, D.C., United States of America. It serves as one of the leading sources of development financing for the countri ...
, the
UN Convention on Climate Change, and the
International Labour Organization
The International Labour Organization (ILO) is a United Nations agency whose mandate is to advance social and economic justice by setting international labour standards. Founded in October 1919 under the League of Nations, it is one of the firs ...
.
In
Argentina
Argentina, officially the Argentine Republic, is a country in the southern half of South America. It covers an area of , making it the List of South American countries by area, second-largest country in South America after Brazil, the fourt ...
, The Movement of Excluded Workers (excluded in the sense that their work is not recognized by the government and they are excluded from receiving rights) is the largest waste pickers organization. It is a social organization, independent from political parties, which brings together more than 2,000
cartoneros (waste picker) in Capital Federal and the suburbs, specifically in the neighborhoods of
Lanús
Lanús () is the capital of Lanús Partido, Buenos Aires Province in Argentina. It lies just south of the capital city Buenos Aires, in the Greater Buenos Aires conurbation, metropolitan area. The List of cities in Argentina, city has a populati ...
and
Lomas de Zamora
Lomas de Zamora is a city in the province of Buenos Aires, Argentina, located south of the City of Buenos Aires and within the metropolitan area of Greater Buenos Aires. It is the capital of Lomas de Zamora Partido and has a population of 111,897 ...
. After years of sacrifice and struggle, they managed to improve their working conditions. They have established a more
logistical system—they no longer travel by hanging off of trucks, they have obtained a work incentive and uniforms, and lastly they have founded a nursery for 160 children, some of whom worked in the past as cartoneros. However, they still have to advance in designing a social security program that includes all the cartoneros of
Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires, controlled by the government of the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires, is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Argentina. It is located on the southwest of the Río de la Plata. Buenos Aires is classified as an Alpha− glob ...
. Additionally, they have to raise awareness among residents of the city to separate their trash so that they can collect door to door, without having direct contact with wet materials.
Organizing in Asia
India
India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...
is home to Asia's largest waste picker movement.
Self-Employed Women's Association of India, a
trade union
A trade union (British English) or labor union (American English), often simply referred to as a union, is an organization of workers whose purpose is to maintain or improve the conditions of their employment, such as attaining better wages ...
that exclusively organizes women in the informal economy and has membership of over one million, began organizing waste pickers in the late 1970s. SEWA has created nearly ninety waste pickers cooperatives, which members use to gain collective work contracts and access to credit, training, and markets.
One of Asia's largest waste picker associations is The Alliance of Indian Waste Pickers (AIW), a national network of 35 organizations in 22 cities. The AIW facilitates peers support, advocacy and cross-learning among waste pickers, iterant buyers, and support NGOs.
Also in India, the All India Kabari Mazdoor Mahasangh (AIKMM) is locked in a battle with the
New Delhi Municipal Council, which closed a deal with the
Hyderabad
Hyderabad is the capital and largest city of the Indian state of Telangana. It occupies on the Deccan Plateau along the banks of the Musi River (India), Musi River, in the northern part of Southern India. With an average altitude of , much ...
-based company, Ramky Energy and Environment Ltd to manage the waste, in effect criminalising the work of more than 100,000 unorganised waste pickers that currently sort about 20% of Delhi's garbage. The
EJOLT project made a video on what they call the Delhi waste war. Waste pickers in
Thailand
Thailand, officially the Kingdom of Thailand and historically known as Siam (the official name until 1939), is a country in Southeast Asia on the Mainland Southeast Asia, Indochinese Peninsula. With a population of almost 66 million, it spa ...
have also organized, including the
Khon Kaen scavengers.
In Delhi, the NGO Chintan Environmental Research and Action Group makes the work of waste pickers safer (by providing gloves and mouth masks) and it also provides for a steady source of income (by paying a monthly wage to the waste pickers).
An Indian waste pickers union known as KKPKP recently carried out a mapping initiative to identify organizations of or that work with waste pickers across the continent—a first step towards the development an Asian network. Several NGOs and trade unions that work with waste pickers, as well as loosely formed groups of waste pickers, were identified in Cambodia, Indonesia, The Philippines, and Thailand.
In Bangladesh, Grambangla Unnayan Committee is working with the waste picker community at Matuail Waste Dumpsite of
Dhaka City Corporation. A daycare centre and a non-formal primary school has been established for the child waste pickers where 112 child waste pickers are given early childhood care and education. Women waste pickers of Matuail has formed a Waste Pickers' cooperative.
In Pune (India) there are a worker cooperative of Waste Pickers, called SWaCH. SWaCH is an acronym for Solid Waste Collection Handling that also means clean, in the local language. This initiative empower all members. They all work, they're not merely shareholders. Among the workers, in most age groups, women constitute a bigger group than men, with a total of 78%. However, men are the majority in the youngest age group. Before joining SWaCH, most members used to work as waste pickers or itinerant waste buyers. There's also another group that is constituted by former housekeeping and cleaning workers. The predominant group of SWaCH belongs to the Scheduled Caste, although other Backward Castes, as well as the middle castes, are also represented in SWaCH. This initiative is a result of Inclusive cities project that has the objective of integrating Waste Pickers into Municipal Solid Waste Management in Pune (India).
Organizing in Africa
Egypt
Egypt ( , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a country spanning the Northeast Africa, northeast corner of Africa and Western Asia, southwest corner of Asia via the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to northe ...
has one of the world's most well-established and robust informal recycling systems. The labor is done for the most part by the
Zabaleen (informal waste collectors), a predominantly
Coptic Christian community, which in the 1940s began collecting garbage—work viewed as impure by Egypt's Muslim majority. In 2003, the Zabaleen's existence and way of life came under threat when Cairo authorities awarded annual contracts $50 to three multinational garbage disposal companies, pushing the Zabaleen to collectively defend their livelihood.
The South African Waste Picker Association (SWAPA) was constituted in July 2009, which included 100 waste pickers from 26 landfills across the country.
SWAPA currently (2024) has a membership of between 4000 and 6000 members drawn from all of South Africa’s nine provinces.
There are no present plans to create an African waste picker's network, but Shack/Slum Dwellers International organized meetings between waste picker leaders in Kenya, Egypt, and South Africa.
See also
*
Dumpster diving
Dumpster diving (also totting, skipping, skip diving or skip salvage) is wikt:salvage, salvaging from large commercial, residential, industrial and construction containers for unwanted items discarded by their owners but deemed useful to the ...
*
Gleaning
*
Junk man
*
Rag-and-bone man
A rag-and-bone man or ragpicker (UK English) or ragman, old-clothesman, junkman, or junk dealer (US English), also called a bone-grubber, bone-picker, chiffonnier, rag-gatherer, rag-picker, bag board, or totter, collects unwanted household items ...
*
Ragpicker
*
Tosher
*
Mudlark
*
Canner (recycling)
References
External links
Velis, C. et al. (2012). An analytical framework and tool ('InteRa') for integrating the informal recycling sector in waste and resource management systems in developing countries. Waste Management & Research 30(9) Supplement 43–66Global Alliance of Waste Pickersnetwork of networks of waste pickers, mainly from Asia, Africa and Latin America.
* Chintan is an environmental research and action group unitin
wastepickersa virtual exhibition about ragpickers
{{DEFAULTSORT:Waste Picker
Cleaning and maintenance occupations
Waste collection
Poverty
Recycling
Reuse