The international trade in toxic waste has been outlawed since the Basle Convention came into force in 1992. Since then, Earth Report has followed nations' efforts to enforce its provisions.

This film takes a look at how the Basel Ban has stopped toxic traders dumping their waste on the doorsteps of developing nations.

Toxic past

In the 1980's, revelations that the industrialised world was exporting poisonous wastes to poor East European and African countries caused a public outcry.

Responding to pressure - especially from Africa - governments turned to the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) to get agreement on how to control the transport of hazardous wastes.

Although criticised by environmentalists and developing nations, the Basle Convention has been surprisingly effective in curbing the poison trade.

But there is a toxic legacy to be cleared up.

Italy's toxic traders

In 1988, drums of highly poisoness toxic waste were dumped on Nigeria's Koko Beach by Italian waste traders. The content of these drums were poisoness enough to cause burns, blood vomiting and partial paralysis to the Nigerians who touched them. Soon after, Nigeria seized an Italian ship to force Italy to remove the waste.

Toxic waste comes from factories like ACNA in Northern Italy, which have produced toxic chemicals for the last one hundred years.

Because toxic waste had value, it started to be traded by brokers who could make money by sidestepping new environmental laws.

Gianfranco Ambrosini traded waste with his partner company Jelly Wax, shipping poisons to Africa and the Middle East. But in the late 1980's, the tide began to turn against the trade in toxic waste.

One shipment, destined for Djibouti, was discovered and banned. Then, after failing to export this waste to Venezuela, the shipment was hastily re-routed to Syria. In Syria, the waste was discovered and loaded at gunpoint into a barely seaworthy ship called the Zanoobia. After two years at sea, 2,000 tons of poisonous cargo arrived back in Italy.

Although this shipment wasn't dumped, no one really knows how much waste has been dumped over the years.

In the 1980s, officials reckoned that a tenth of all toxic waste was exported abroad - about 10 million tons of that going to poorer, developing countries every year. Here was a toxic time bomb waiting to go off. It was time to bring in the law.

A glimmer of hope

In 1987, UNEP started work on an international agreement to control toxic waste.

While industry wanted fewer restrictions, environmentalists, backed by public outrage, wanted a total ban on toxic waste exports. After hard bargaining, representatives from 132 countries finally agreed to control toxic waste.

The resulting Basle Convention had a profound effect on stamping out the worst excesses of the toxic waste trade. Needless to say, the toxic traders were not happy.

But they soon found a loophole - recycling. By marking the waste as 'recyclable', traders could export it for the valuable materials that might be extracted. But it was all a sham. Not until five years later, when the convention became international law, could the export of all toxic waste be banned.

Lebanon legacy

Before the ban in 1992, thousands of barrels of Italian carcinogenic chemicals, poisonous solvents and decomposing pesticides were sent to civil war torn Lebanon.

In 1987, Lebanon's right-wing Christian militia were paid millions of dollars to import 15,000 barrels of toxic material and 20 containers from Italy. The only problem was, they had no idea of what to do with it.

Dumped across the country, the waste poisoned soil and water supplies. To this day, there are no accurate records identifying where all the waste was dumped - much remains unaccounted for - and this could have serious implications for Lebanon's fledgling tourist industry.

Although Italy bears some responsibility for the clean up, Lebanon will have to prove that chemicals imported from Italy caused the contamination. As yet there is no agreement between the two countries and the waste remains in the public domain.

Zambia's unwanted gifts

Zambia is one country where governments are trying to make amends for a policy that gave farmers agro-chemicals that had unforeseen consequences.

Banned in the West, pesticides such as DDT, lindane, endosulphane, atrazine and diazinon, were once seen as a boon for growing food in poor countries and were donated as aid.

But the farmers received little training in their safe use and many preferred not to use them, storing the chemicals in unsafe conditions for more than 30 years. In one warehouse, inches of DDT dust were found. Unaware of the risk, children crawled in here to play.

The German aid agency GTZ discovered the dangers and found 360 tons of agro-chemicals at seven sites all over Zambia.

A $1.2 million European and United Nations clean-up programme contracted a British company to remove and repack the obsolete chemicals.

In the end, all these out-of-date pesticides were sent to be incinerated, but thousands of tons of agricultural toxic waste remain in Africa.

Cleaning up the chemicals

To get rid of toxic waste, it's either buried in a landfill - which threatens water supplies - or it's incinerated - which can create the most lethal poisons known to man, like dioxins. Even in almost immeasurably small doses, dioxin induces cancer, birth defects and immune system damage.

Now, scientists are finding new ways to convert toxic wastes into harmless substances - like combining hazardous chemicals with catalysts to form inert substances or using reed beds to breakdown man-made poisons. But more far reaching solutions, like minimising waste generation at source, must be found.

Sharing the knowledge

To find other solutions, regional centres - which pool resources and information on hazardous waste - have been established throughout all five continents.

But almost ten years on from the ban, more toxic waste is being produced. It's clear that the next step forward is that of apportioning liability.

But much more important than avoiding the export of hazardous waste is simply to avoid hazardous waste production altogether.