On October 25, 2018, Cabinet agreed to amend the Import and Export
Negative Lists to include hazardous waste listed
under the Basel Convention, as a mechanism to provide legislative support to the Convention’s implementation.
The EPPD would have initiated and spearheaded this long and arduous process through
the hosting of a series of meetings with key stakeholders and providing technical input to the draft legal notices. After several years this eventually
culminated in their finalisation and the publishing of the amendments.
In effect, these amendments create a
regulatory mechanism to monitor and control the movement of hazardous waste entering and exiting the country, by way of documentation and issuance of a licence for the hazardous
wastes being transported. Additionally,
they aid in restricting the transboundary movement and unwarranted transit
of hazardous wastes across the country’s borders. This is a significant regulatory
measure, particularly in the absence of comprehensive domestic legislation.
The Basel Convention was developed in response to the problems caused by
the dramatic rise in the cost of disposal of hazardous wastes, which made it
more cost effective for developed countries to dispose of their hazardous waste
by shipping it to developing countries and to Eastern Europe, leading to
impacts to human and environmental health. The treaty was therefore established
to regulate the transboundary movements of hazardous wastes and imposes
obligations on Parties to ensure that such waste are managed and disposed of in
an environmentally sound manner.
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