An impoverished woman searching for recyclable bottles in a rubbish bin on Nanjing Road, the main shopping district, during the May holiday weekend.

A girl passes a heap of circuit boards in an alley, holding her nose because of the strong smell of tin solder. Every year Guiyu takes in more than a million tons of computer waste, imported from all...

Workers sort through different types of metal recovered from old computers. Every year Guiyu takes in more than a million tons of computer waste, imported from all over the world. About 40,000 local...

Boy recycling plastic.

By the riverbanks of the Bagmati river (near its confluence with the Balkhu), cardboard waste is collected to be weighed, paid for, loaded onto trucks and transported to recycling plants.

Women make clothes from recycled materials using sewing machines in a workshop.

Rubbish recycler having a sleep next to his cart loaded with his latest hoard, including an old TV set.

United Nations World Food Programme (UN WFP) oil cans being reused to house seedlings.

Siah (right) and Mohammed scavenge a city dump for plastic they can sell for recycling. Siah's arm was amputated by rebel militia during the civil war and now lives on the streets. Thousands of innoce...

Gheo and Vacille collecting scrap metal. In Calea Vacaresti, south east of the capital, four families have made their homes in the dried out basin of an artificial lake, constructing shacks from brick...

Ankle bracelets and shoes made from car tyres.The Karamojong are a cattle-herding, pastoralist people who live in semi-permanent settlements.

Medicine bottes are washed for resale to the pharmaceutical business by a privately owned recycling enterprise.

Workers weld new ventilation pipes at China Clean Energy Inc. The company recycles waste cooking oil products into precursor materials that will eventually make bio-desiel, epoxies, printing dyes, or...

A worker maintains a large pressurized filter that extracts a liquid from recycled cooking oil at China Clean Energy Inc. This precursor liquid will eventually make bio-desiel, epoxies, printing dyes,...

A worker pushes a barrel past storage tanks at China Clean Energy Inc in Fuqing. The company recycles waste cooking oil products into precursor materials that will eventually make bio-desiel, epoxies,...

A worker adjusts a series of valves during production at China Clean Energy Inc. The company recycles waste cooking oil products into precursor materials that will eventually make bio-desiel, epoxies,...

A woman helps to push a cart filled with scrap metal near Wenzhou. While some of the scrap material is collected from around the country, most are imported in bulk from developed countries overseas.

A worker uses a blow torch to cut up a gas canister at a recycling yard near Wenzhou. While some of the scrap material is collected from around the country, most is imported in bulk from developed cou...

Workers break down and sort scrap materials at a recycling yard near Wenzhou. While some of the scrap material is collected from around the country, most are imported in bulk from developed countries...

Metal recycling business - recycling munitions left over from the war.

Boy from a homeless family makes money recycling plastic from the beach.

Child labour. A young girl works collecting metal and plastic from the city's main rubbish dump.

Child labour. A young boy works collecting metal and plastic from the city's main rubbish dump.

An old man pulling a train of shopping trolleys with rubbish collected for recycling, in the Barri de Gracia.

Children living and working on a rubbish dump, collecting metal and plastic to sell for recycling.

Labourers work in a recycling factory, where paper is made into sheets of cardboard.

A woman sorts through chips recovered from old computers. Every year Guiyu takes in more than a million tons of computer waste, imported from all over the world. About 40,000 local farmers and 100,00...

Women sort through computer chips. They work 9 hours a day, 6 days a week for a pittance, and are not allowed to talk whilst they work. Every year Guiyu takes in more than a million tons of computer...

On her way to school a girl passes a truck laden with computer hardware. Every year Guiyu takes in more than a million tons of computer waste, imported from all over the world. About 40,000 local far...

A boy runs past a heap of circuit boards in an alley. Every year Guiyu takes in more than a million tons of computer waste, imported from all over the world. About 40,000 local farmers and 100,000 mi...

A woman cleaning the pavement outside her home, which is littered with old computers. Every year Guiyu takes in more than a million tons of computer waste, imported from all over the world. About 40,...

Young worker carries heavy slabs of steel salvaged from one of the many supertankers being broken up in a ship-breaking yard on the Bay of Bengal. The industry employs thousands of workers and is the...

A boy playing inside a pile of life belts sold at his father's marine salvage store. Shops in the area sell all sorts of items recovered from boats broken up in ship-breaking yards on the Bay of Benga...

Teenage boy making charcoal stoves from empty American Food Aid cans, at the Medeber recycling and small industry facility.

A young Palestinian boy strips cars of electrical wiring to supplement his family's income. Mas'ha village, where they live, has been cut off by the new security fence, meaning that many people cannot...

Rubbish collected for recycling by the Bagmati River.

Women working in a rubbish disposal and recycling plant (with a male overseer).

Women working in a rubbish disposal and recycling plant (with a male overseer).

Ship-breaking yard on the Bay of Bengal. The industry employs thousands of workers and is the country's main source of steel, but injuries and deaths, often from explosions, are common. The environmen...

Ship-breaking yard on the Bay of Bengal. The industry employs thousands of workers and is the country's main source of steel, but injuries and deaths, often from explosions, are common. The environmen...

Ship-breaking yard on the Bay of Bengal. The industry employs thousands of workers and is the country's main source of steel, but injuries and deaths, often from explosions, are common. The environmen...

Ship-breaking yard on the Bay of Bengal. The industry employs thousands of workers and is the country's main source of steel, but injuries and deaths, often from explosions, are common. The environmen...

Street children collecting waste from a rubbish dump for recycling.

Men collecting cardboard boxes for recycling.

A woman pushing a heavily-laden cart of waste collected for recycling. Shenyang is one of the main heavy industry bases in China. Today the factories are not profitable any more and most of them are c...

'Cambio Verde' ('Green Exchange') food for rubbish programme. Residents of the favelas collect garbage for recycling.

‘Rustyman', a scrap iron collector. He collects all sorts of junk, from old cars to front doors, lawnmowers to folding chairs, even unoccupied houses. "I've got everything. Except money."

Ship-breaking yard on the Bay of Bengal. The industry employs thousands of workers and is the country's main source of steel, but injuries and deaths, often from explosions, are common. The environmen...

Ship-breaking yard on the Bay of Bengal. The industry employs thousands of workers and is the country's main source of steel, but injuries and deaths, often from explosions, are common. The environmen...

Ship-breaking yard on the Bay of Bengal. The industry employs thousands of workers and is the country's main source of steel, but injuries and deaths, often from explosions, are common. The environmen...

Ship-breaking yard on the Bay of Bengal. The industry employs thousands of workers and is the country's main source of steel, but injuries and deaths, often from explosions, are common. The environmen...

Ship-breaking yard on the Bay of Bengal. The industry employs thousands of workers and is the country's main source of steel, but injuries and deaths, often from explosions, are common. The environmen...

Ship-breaking yard on the Bay of Bengal. The industry employs thousands of workers and is the country's main source of steel, but injuries and deaths, often from explosions, are common. The environmen...

Ship-breaking yard on the Bay of Bengal. The industry employs thousands of workers and is the country's main source of steel, but injuries and deaths, often from explosions, are common. The environmen...

Ship-breaking yard on the Bay of Bengal. The industry employs thousands of workers and is the country's main source of steel, but injuries and deaths, often from explosions, are common. The environmen...

Ship-breaking yard on the Bay of Bengal. The industry employs thousands of workers and is the country's main source of steel, but injuries and deaths, often from explosions, are common. The environmen...

Ship-breaking yard on the Bay of Bengal. The industry employs thousands of workers and is the country's main source of steel, but injuries and deaths, often from explosions, are common. The environmen...

Rural Technology Centre. Building a cement panel using waste materials.

Young boy collecting plastic and metal on the street to re-use or sell.

Poor man scavenging for rubbish to collect. His pick is magnetised to help him pick up small scraps of metal.

Poor man pulling cart loaded with polystyrene that he has collected to sell for a small sum to a recycling business.

Poor women collecting rubbish to sell for recycling from the side of a railway line. Guangdong Province.

Migrant with a cart-load of cardboard collected to sell for recycling.

Old woman pushing cart of collected cardboard to sell for recycling, passing behind the Gulou (Drum Tower).

A Kurdish family stands behind the fence outside their home, which is made of recycled war materials. Millions of landmines and unexploded ordnance litter the former front line in the Iran/Iraq war, s...

Villagers recycling medicine bottles.

Factory manufacturing aluminium buckets.

A father and his sons making a living by recycling television boxes.

Welder wearing a home-made cardboard mask for protection in a metal recycling workshop. It is one of many such workshops in the Medeber district producing custom-made products such as kitchen utensils...

A workshop producing household utensils such as pots and pans from recycled metal, in the Medeber district.

Sacks which once contained food aid from the USA recycled to make straw mattresses. Ciudad el Alto.

Ship-breaking yard on the Bay of Bengal. The industry employs thousands of workers and is the country's main source of steel, but injuries and deaths, often from explosions, are common. The environmen...

Boy working in the ship-breaking industry, reducing rusting hulks to scrap iron and other reusable materials.

Child labour: Dozens of abandoned street kids live and work in the city's huge rubbish dump, collecting materials that can be reused. This girl is collecting plastic.

Child labour: a young girl employed in a workshop recycling industrial oil cans.

Child labour: Dozens of abandoned street kids live and work in the city's huge rubbish dump, collecting materials which can be reused. Most of them are addicted to glue.

Child with cart full of cardboard collected to be re-sold for recycling, the upper piece bearing Japanese company Toshiba's name.

Stacks of computer monitor tubes. Every year Guiyu takes in more than a million tons of computer waste, imported primarily from the United States, Japan and South Korea. 40,000 local farmers and 100,0...

Children playing in front of piles of recycled computer material. Every year Guiyu takes in more than a million tons of computer waste, imported primarily from the United States, Japan and South Korea...

Young girls sort tiny metal parts that have been recycled from e-waste. Every year Guiyu takes in more than a million tons of computer waste, imported primarily from the United States, Japan and Sout...

Computer waste lies everywhere in Guiyu. China has banned the import of electronic waste and ratified the Basel Convention. But occasional crackdowns have done little to halt the recycling, which thr...

Computer waste dump next to the Lianjiang River. The villagers burn this waste during the night. It is highly likely that the emissions and ashes contain high levels of brominated and chlorinated diox...

Computer waste lies everywhere in Guiyu. China has banned the import of electronic waste and ratified the Basel Convention. But occasional crackdowns have done little to halt the recycling, which thr...

Mother proudly displays her baby next to the computer waste dump by the Lianjiang River. The villagers burn this waste during the night. It is highly likely that the emissions and ashes contain high l...

Circuit boards are heated over charcoal burners to free the computer chips that might be reusable. This worker is in serious danger of catching respiratory diseases, skin diseases, eye infections and...

Young girls sort tiny metal parts that have been recycled from e-waste. Every year Guiyu takes in more than a million tons of computer waste, imported primarily from the United States, Japan and Sout...

Dismantling computer monitors in Guiyu, the e-waste centre of China. E-waste is imported primarily from the United States, but also originates in Hong Kong, Japan and South Korea. It is one of the mos...

Woman washing clothes in the Lianjiang River beside the computer waste dump. What was once a poor farming region has become a promised land thanks to the e-waste business. But Guiyu is no glittering s...

Circuit boards are heated over charcoal burners to free the computer chips that might be reusable. This worker is in serious danger of catching respiratory diseases, skin diseases, eye infections and...

Young girls sort tiny metal parts that have been recycled from e-waste. Every year Guiyu takes in more than a million tons of computer waste, imported primarily from the United States, Japan and Sout...