Each year in New Zealand a community driven event called eDay is held. It is funded by the Ministry for the Environment and aims to encourage New Zealanders to recycle old mobile phones and other electronic equipment.
This year, the event takes place on Saturday 6th November with 50 drop-off locations around the country where schools, householders, community groups and small businesses can take their old equipment to be recycled for free.
Since the inception of eDay in 2007, 196,000 items of e-waste have been dropped off for recycling and as a result nearly 2,337 tonnes of electronic waste (e-waste) have been diverted from landfill.
It is hoped that the event this weekend will divert another 1,000 tonnes of e-waste from landfill.
The New Zealand government estimates 80,000 tonnes of electronic waste is disposed of into landfills in New Zealand every year. The National organiser of eDay, Laurence Zwimpfer, said:
“Landfilling e-waste is a danger to our environment due to its toxic nature and does not allow for the recovery and reuse of precious material such as gold,”.
This year the organisers of the event are also encouraging communities to work together to collect their neighbourhood e-waste together and take just one trip to the drop-off locations.