After a childhood on the dump, John Chweya wants to ensure rights are enshrined in plastic pollution treaty
Wasterpickers, also known as ragpickers in India, and scavengers elsewhere, are people who make a living from sorting waste and digging through landfills for saleable stuff - raw materials like plastic , metals, textiles (used in India to make newsprint for example), wood, cardboard etc or items thrown away inthe trash.
There's an entire informal economic & industrial ecosystem that exists behind the formal and visisble one in "developing countries" - its a post consumption economy that's parts of the informal economy and I'll be sharing more stuff on this topic as well.
Y'all would have seen my tag REculture - that's what it refers to - the postconsumption economy of recycle, reuse, repair, repurpose and resell that's invisible.
