There is a sale going on right now and it’s time to buy that new phone you’ve been eyeing for some time now. Yes, yes, the swanky new gadget is about to be yours soon! But what about the old one? What’s to be done with that?
Electronic waste or e-waste as it is called is the scrap from electronic devices. It could be phones, earphones, chargers, cables, old gadgets or even bulbs. These wastes are generally thrown in the garbage and are hardly recycled. This has created a burgeoning problem as they are not bio-degradable and end up in landfill.
According to research done by United Nations, India does not have a large quantity of precious metals like Cobalt which is required for electronic devices. In addition to this, we throw away most of it instead of recycling in the landfill. This makes us the 5th country after the US, China, Japan and Germany.
The easiest way to solve this issue is to recycle our waste responsibly. A quick google search will give you the scrap dealer details who can collect the e-waste from your home and get it recycled.
But there is another opinion which, albeit unpopular, gives you something to think about. Is it really necessary to buy that latest phone even though your current one is working just fine…Most of our gadgets hold our attention only for some time before getting dumped in a corner of some drawer. Heck, I don’t even remember where I kept my uber cool i-pod. It might feel like our lives are getting stalled unless we buy that new shiny stuff, but in reality, it’s just another fad. With the climate change glaring us right in the eye, we need to think about our choices and consciously make decisions which will ultimately affect our future.