Japan Breaches Toxic Waste Trade Treaty

Japan Breaches Toxic Waste Trade Treaty

March 2007 - Since 2002, Japan 
has been laying the groundwork for a plan to liberalize and 
promote toxic waste trade among Asian countries in violation 
of an international treaty, claims a hazardous waste watchdog 
group based in Seattle. 
The Seattle-based Basel Action Network, BAN, filed a formal 
complaint against Japan on Monday concerning what BAN calls 
Japan's "intent to create toxic waste colonies around Asia." 
BAN says that Japan is utilizing bilateral trade agreements 
concluded with Singapore, the Philippines, Malaysia, and 
Thailand that eliminate tariffs on hazardous wastes such as 
pharmaceutical wastes and waste oils containing PCBs to 
promote trade in these substances. 
"The manner in which these trade agreements are being used we 
believe constitutes non-compliance with the Basel Convention," 
BAN said in a notification to United Nations agencies, Japan's 
Foreign Affairs and Environmental Ministries, and the Basel 
Convention Secretariat. 
The Basel Convention on the Control of Transboundary Movements 
of Hazardous Wastes and their Disposal is the most 
comprehensive global environmental agreement on hazardous and 
other wastes. It has over 160 Parties and aims to protect 
human health and the environment against the adverse effects 
resulting from the generation, management, transboundary 
movements and disposal of hazardous and other wastes. It came 
into force in 1992. 
The Basel Convention has two pillars. First, it regulates the 
transboundary movements of hazardous and other wastes. Second, 
the Convention obliges its Parties to ensure that such wastes 
are managed and disposed of in an environmentally sound 
manner. 
The Basel Non-Compliance Notification Report on Japan's 
activities prepared by the Basel Action Network is the third 
NGO non-compliance notification prepared by BAN. 
This NGO process is needed, BAN says, because the Basel 
Convention's official non-compliance mechanism does not allow 
any triggering mechanism for civil society, and lacks any 
accountability or enforcement provisions. 
"It is with sadness that herein we are forwarding to your 
office the enclosed Basel Non-Compliance Notification with 
evidence that the nation of Japan has been found to very 
likely not be in compliance with the Basel Convention," BAN 
Coordinator James Puckett wrote in a letter to UN Environment 
Programme Executive Director Achim Steiner on Monday. 
Higashine Landfill, Japan 
BAN says that Japan is throwing its economic weight around 
among developing nations to force them to take Japanese 
hazardous wastes "in the same manner" that Japan has been able 
to dominate the International Whaling Convention to counter 
the global consensus to eliminate the commercial whaling 
industry. 
"Japan appears to be using similar tactics to undermine the 
Basel Convention consensus to eliminate hazardous waste 
trafficking from developed to developing countries," BAN 
claims. 
"Instead of looking for hiding places for its toxic wastes, 
Japan should clean up its act and eliminate toxic inputs in 
products, minimize its hazardous waste generation, and deal 
with its own wastes at home," said Richard Gutierrez, Basel 
Action Network, Asia-Pacific. 
On October 31, 2002, when Japan and Singapore exchanged 
diplomatic notes ushering in the entry into force of the 
Japan-Singapore Economic Partnership Agreement. 
On December 31, 2005, the Japan-Malaysia Economic Partnership 
Agreement was signed in Kuala Lumpur. 
On September 9, 2006, the Japan-Philippine Economic Agreement, 
JPEPA, was signed at Helsinki, Finland. 
For two years, Philippine civil society groups tried to obtain 
copies of the draft agreement and negotiation documents to 
understand the nature of the trade pact between the two 
countries. It was only after a case was filed before the 
Philippine Supreme Court demanding the disclosure of the 
documents and after all negotiations were finished that the 
text of the JPEPA was shown to civil society groups in October 
2006. 
BAN’s research reveals that all three trade agreements are 
similar - they include the same toxic wastes and confer the 
same preferential tariff reductions. The agreements also share 
similar provisions prohibiting the imposition of non-tariff 
measures on these toxic wastes. 
The Fluidized Bed Incineration System can completely 
incinerate sewage sludge. 
BAN and a coalition of Philippine civil society groups began 
to publicize the issue in the Philippines. In recent weeks 
following national debate about the case, the Philippine 
government revealed that Japan insisted that the JPEPA "was an 
all-or-nothing deal, preventing any possibility of deleting 
the 'toxic' provisions from the agreement." 
Japan ratified the JPEPA in December 2006. On the Philippine 
side, due to the 2007 mid-term elections, the Philippine 
Senate has not acted on the JPEPA ratification. Philippine 
President Gloria Arroyo has been clear, however, that the 
JPEPA is a priority treaty, which the Philippine Senate should 
ratify as soon as it resumes work in June. 
Philippine civil society groups have begun to call for the 
rejection of its present draft by the Philippine Senate and a 
re-examination of the agreement. 
Often involved in the Economic Partnership Agreements are 
unspoken quid-pro quos deals such as the Philippines promised 
access to domestic and nursing labor markets in Japan, or 
Thailand getting a package mass transit investment for 
Bangkok. 
BAN fears these promises may "trump concerns over violations 
of international law." 
In January, more than 25 environmental groups at the Waste Not 
Asia Conference in Kerala, India, collectively called for the 
rejection of the "growing Japanese waste colonialism in Asia 
under the guise of Japanese Economic Partnership Agreements." 
"Asia is not Japan’s dumping ground," said Jayakumar Chelaton 
of the Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives, convenor 
of the WNA. 
"It is both an affront to international law and morally 
repugnant for a rich country such as Japan to bully poorer 
nations with its money into accepting its toxic effluent," 
Chelaton said. 
"Asia needs a vision for the future out of its waste dilemma, 
not the re-packaged and failed model of exploitation and 
environmental degradation that Japan is peddling under JPEPA," 
said Gutierrez. 
In the first quarter of 2007, Japan finished negotiations with 
Thailand on the Japan-Thailand Economic Partnership Agreement, 
JTEPA. 
This incineration/melting kiln can be used to dispose of 
hazardous industrial wastes, infectious medical wastes, and 
waste plastics. 
The calls of Philippine civil society groups against the JPEPA 
and its toxic waste trade reverberated throughout the Asian 
region, prompting Thai groups to demand disclosure of the 
draft treaty. The Thai Foreign Ministry confirmed the presence 
of toxic wastes in JTEPA, but the full text has not yet been 
revealed to the public, nor have the toxic waste provisions 
been removed. 
Japan is now in negotiations with Indonesia and India for 
their bilateral Economic Partnership Agreements. 
On February 19, environmental, public health, human rights, 
economic justice, and farmer groups from around the world 
submitted a joint letter to Japanese and Indian foreign 
affairs and environmental officials demanding the exclusion of 
toxic technologies and internationally controlled or banned 
wastes from the negotiations on the India-Japan Comprehensive 
Economic Partnership Agreement. 
Takeshi Yasuma of Citizens Against Chemicals Pollution in 
Tokyo said, "Unfortunately these Japanese free trade 
agreements like JPEPA in the Philippines or JTEPA in Thailand 
reinforce an immoral strategy to reassert a waste colonialism 
which the Basel Convention had hoped to consign to the history 
books." 
"The intention on the part of Japan to dump its unwanted 
wastes on our country is obviously there," said Kittikhun 
Kittiaram of Greenpeace in Thailand. 
"Japan is banking on the desperation of the government to 
improve trade status with Japan or to get developmental aid," 
Kittiaram said. "But it is a contradiction to expect a nation 
to sacrifice its environmental health to become economically 
healthy. A destroyed environment and a toxic legacy is a 
devastating cost that will get paid sooner or later and it 
will be us and not Japan paying that bill when it comes due." 
Japan is also negotiating Economic Partnership Agreements with 
a range of other countries including Australia, Vietnam and 
Chile. 





 

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