4 August 2010 Last updated at 08:04 ET

By Aidan Lewis BBC News, Rotterdam

Old televisions and computers containing hazardous substances are still being exported from Europe despite a ban aimed at stopping the trade, which poisons workers at makeshift recycling plants in Africa and Asia.

In Rotterdam a Dutch customs officer swings open a heavy metal door to reveal a pile of old televisions stacked tight within a shipping container.

Instead of proceeding to Ivory Coast, these goods will be impounded, checked and most likely sent back to Germany, from where they arrived.

This is the front line of the European effort to stop electronic and electrical equipment, consumed and discarded in ever greater quantities, from being dumped in the developing world.

What is e-waste?

• E-waste includes TVs, telephones, computers, white goods, and everyday household electrical items from toasters to toys
• Circuit boards are prized as scrap, because they contain gold, silver, copper and other elements
• These can only be retrieved safely with specialised recycling procedures
• ‘Backyard recycling’ may expose people to lead and mercury, dioxins from burning plastic, and hazardous leaching agents such as cyanide

The e-waste contains valuable metals, which are extracted at informal recycling sites.

But it also contains toxic heavy metals and hazardous chemicals that are handled by workers, some of them children.

Read Full Article: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-10846395

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