vironmentalists and the United Nations urged rich countries Thursday to ratify a ban on dumping their toxic waste on the developing world.
“It’s endangering the oceans, poisoning the soil and air and especially causing acute health problems,” Klaus Topfer, executive director of the U.N. Environment Program, told a conference on waste management.
Topfer called on the more than 300 delegates from 117 countries to show solidarity in ratifying a 1995 agreement that bans the export of toxic waste from industrialized nations to the developing world. The five-day meeting ends today.
If ratified, the agreement — an extension of the 1989 Basel Convention regulating the international traffic of hazardous waste — would be the first global ban, although there are regional pacts against trafficking in hazardous waste.
Although the United States signed the Basel Convention in 1989, it has not signed on to the ban.
The European Community and seven other countries have ratified the ban, but count is nowhere near the three-fourths majority of votes needed from the 117-member body to pass.
Topfer estimated about 450 million tons of toxic waste are created annually. One goal of the convention is to set up regional centers for training in the technology and management of hazardous waste.