Orange unveils mobile recycling scheme in Africa

The facility based in the city of Abidjan is the fifth such development built by Orange and Emmas in Africa, which is part of an ongoing initiative between the two organisations to encourage recycling of mobile devices, launched in 2005.

It was officially unveiled on Wednesday (July 23) in an inauguration ceremony attended by the Ivoirian minister for the environment Rmi Allah Kouadio and CEO of the Orange Cte dIvoire Tlcom group Joseph Pitah.

To mark the event, a first container loaded with 10 tonnes of mobile waste left Ivory Coast during the ceremony for recycling in France.

The first collection and dismantling facility began operations in Burkina Faso in March 2010, which was followed by three more plants in Benin, Madagascar and Niger.

Each facility is run by six local employees, who oversee collection of more than 10 tonnes of mobile waste every year to be sent on to France for recycling. Over 140 tonnes of mobile waste has so far been exported since 2010.

Delivery

Upon arrival, French recycling firm Morphosis takes direct delivery of the containers from all five collection facilities at a port in Le Havre. The company sorts the materials before extracting rare metals that can be reused in the manufacture of new products and mobile devices.

In turn, Orange which provides network coverage for 20 African countries – organises annual collections of used mobiles, chargers and batteries across its 1,200 stores in France, with the profits paid into the Emmas Africa Project to improve living conditions for rural communities.

As of 2013, Orange recycling initiatives in France have led to the collection of nearly 750,000 mobile phones.

Due to the rapid uptake of mobile phones in Africa, the industry has become a major environmental issue in recent years. There is an estimated 500 million devices on the continent as well as millions of discarded handsets which are sometimes burned due to a lack of recycling facilities.

Earlier this year, Unviersity of Northampton undergraduate Ben Thomson launched Green Cycle – a social enterprise to tackle the growing problem of electrical waste and its unsafe disposal in the city of Lagos, Nigeria (see letsrecycle.com story).