Wastepickers contracted to work for the municipal corporation of Ahmedabad were shocked to arrive to work in Vejalpur on August 15 and find someone else doing their jobs. Overnight, and on a national holiday, the municipality created a new waste collection contract with a private company called Jigar Transport Company based in Surat city of South Gujarat.

After gathering supportive letter from residents, conducting sit-ins at the offices of Ahmedabad officials, and launching court battles, the wastepickers of Velajpur were given their jobs back but only until September 30^th, at which point their contract runs out. Following this date, it appears that the municipality will work with the Jigar Transport Company.

The contract with Ahmedabad represented a hard-won battle for this particular wastepicker collective, consisting of 366 workers and supported by the Self-Employed Womens Association (SEWA). In a letter drafted to garner support for their plight the wastepickers of Ahmedabad had this to say:

“Our cooperative organises waste paper pickers for alternative employment.  We collect waste door-to-door from people’s homes, thereby making a living with dignity. We are now able to feed our children and send them to school. Our lives have changed. We have moved towards self-reliance.”

 The loss of this contract is a huge blow to these very vulnerable members of Indian society and represents a much larger trend towards corporate privatization in India. Unfortunately, this leaves the poor with a no opportunity for self-reliance, even while waste-pickers continue to provide recycling services in the area. Private corporations take all waste to the landfill without segregating it while wastepickers simply move their segregation and recycling operations into less and less safe environments. This undignified livelihood is even further exacerbated when the waste mafia shows up and demands bribes from waste-pickers to “allow” recycling to happen in certain areas.

For now, the wastepickers of Velajpur continue to fight for their lives.

“We the waste-pickers of the Karyasiddh cooperative request your support and solidarity in our struggle for work with dignity.” 

Bhavanaben, Muktaben, Shardaben,  Madhuben

&

other members of the Executive Committee

of

Shri Karyasiddh Kagad Kam

Mahila SEWA Sahkari Mandali Ltd.

My worlds are converging in India. It was just brought to my attention that some University of British Columbia journalism students, with support from Frontline, have put together a short documentary on E-waste which features wastepickers in Delhi!

The video is fantastic and very informative.

See the following link to watch: http://www.pbs.org/frontlineworld/stories/ghana804/

I have never been to Washington, DC. So, as my plane took off from the west coast and began its journey across the US a couple of hours ago, a sense of excitement took hold. I am really looking forward to touching down in DC, the location of so many important political decisions that affect even me, a Canadian. Granted, I have spent some time in the US, and even took off from the Seattle airport having just spent Memorial Day weekend at a music festival in George, Washington. Somehow, DC seems different.

The Gorge at George

The Gorge at George

I am equally excited to meet the other Peace Fellows that will be receiving training through the Advocacy Project this week. We are a group of about 40 students being sent around the world to aid with capacity building within grassroots organizations working for social change.

I am heading to New Delhi, India with another AP Fellow, Ted Mathys, where we will be working with Chintan Environmental Research and Action Group on issues of environmental injustice within the informal waste-sector. I am nervous about spending time in India and working with a grassroots NGO. In fact, I have completely shied away from international work until now.

Throughout my life as a student, I have focused my work on local issues and have always found many cultural and sustainability challenges to work through in my own back yard. For instance, in working with cattle ranchers on sustainable farming policies for the Canadian prairies, I encountered many communication and trust barriers as an urban vegetarian environmental activist. However, I have found facing these barriers incredibly rewarding and have ultimately made many wonderful friendships while working through cultural differences at a local level.

Yet, upon finishing my undergraduate degree and entering law school, international work has landed in my lap. Increasingly I am asked to work on international environmental law projects and to present my viewpoints on the impacts of this law on sustainable development around the world. Having never worked in a ‘developing’ country I feel uncomfortable adding my perspective into the international environmental law dialogue. Thus, I have signed on to intern in India, and look forward to learning form the people at Chintan and the other AP fellows about how treaty law plays out in practice in New Delhi.

For now, my departure date to India is a few weeks away and as a result I still have time to reflect on where I will be going and what kind of changes this experience will bring to my life. As my plane begins its descent into Reagan International Airport I let the Fleet Foxes lull me to sleep and put both my excitement and apprehensions around what is to come in the back of my mind.