This document discusses environmental racism, which refers to the targeting of minority communities for toxic waste facilities and pollution. It provides historical context, describing how the term emerged in the 1970s-80s civil rights movement. Several cases are examined where minority communities suffered health impacts from nearby pollution, such as lead poisoning from e-waste in China and nitrate contamination of water supplies near North Carolina pig farms. International agreements like the Basel and Bamako Conventions aimed to restrict hazardous waste exports to developing nations. The document advocates for stronger laws and awareness campaigns in Pakistan to address environmental injustices.

1. PRESENTED BY:
ANAM GOHAR
ENVIRONMENTAL RACISM

2. ENVIRONMENTAL RACISM
“It is the racial discrimination in environmental
policy making and the enforcement of regulations
and laws, and the deliberate targeting of people of
color and low income communities for toxic and
hazardous waste facilities.”

3. HISTORICAL BACKGROUND
 The term is tied to the
environmental justice
movement (US-1970s
& 80s).
 “Desperate impact”
standard which
required evidence of
“effect” of
discrimination.
 On international level,
exporting dirty
technologies, dangerous
chemicals or waste
materials banned by the
domestic laws to
developing countries.

4. YOU WANT PROOF??

5. DIFFERENT CASES
 From the mid-1990s until
about 2001, some 50 to 80
percent of the electronics
are estimated to be exported
to China and Southeast Asia
(India, Pakistan, and
Bangladesh).
 Nearly 80 percent of
children in the E-waste hub
of Guiyu, China, suffer
from lead poisoning.

7. DIFFERENT CASES
 The contamination from North Carolina pig farms
has yielded dangerous concentrations of
groundwater nitrates, a leading cause of blue baby
syndrome.
 Ecuador have been subjected to environmental
pollution, sometimes causing health problems, loss
of agriculture, and poverty as Texaco did not properly
dispose of its hazardous waste, causing great
damages to the ecosystem and crippling
communities.

8. BHOPAL TRAGEDY
 On December 3, 1984 methyl isocyanate (produced
for pesticide manufacturing in Union Carbide Ltd
India) leaked as a result of the toxic chemical mixing
with water in the plant in Bhopal.
 Approximately 520,000 people were exposed and
within the first 3 days after the leak an estimated
8,000 people died from exposure to the methyl
isocyanate.

9. BHOPAL TRAGEDY
The World Press Photo shows a child killed by the
poisonous gas leak in the Union Carbide chemical plant
disaster.

10. An explosion at a fertilizer facility in West, TX killed
fifteen people, including local fire-fighters, and leveled
an entire neighborhood in April 2013.

11. IN PAKISTAN ALSO

14. CIVIL RIGHTS MOVEMENT
 The African-American Civil Rights
Movement or 1960s Civil Rights
Movement encompasses social
movements in the United States
whose goals were to end racial
segregation and
discrimination against black
Americans and to secure legal
recognition and federal protection
of the citizenship rights
enumerated in the Constitution
and federal law.

15. ANALYZING RACISM
 The protests in Warren County, North Carolina in
1982, to prevent the siting of a polychlorinated
biphenyls landfill
 1983 US General Accounting Office study, “Siting
of Hazardous Waste Landfills and Their
Correlation with Racial and Economic Status of
Surrounding Communities.”
 “ Three of the four commercial hazardous
waste landfills in the Southeast United States
were located in majority black communities.”

16. COMMISSION FOR RACIAL JUSTICE
 CRJ directed a comprehensive national study on demographic
patterns associated with the location of hazardous waste sites.
1. "the percentage of community residents that belonged to a
racial or ethnic group was a stronger predictor of the level of
commercial hazardous waste activity than was household
income, the value of the homes, the number of uncontrolled
waste sites, or the estimated amount of hazardous wastes
generated by industry”
2. The second study examined the presence of uncontrolled toxic
waste sites in ethnic and racial minority communities, and found
that 3 out of every 5 African and Hispanic Americans lived in
communities with uncontrolled waste sites.

17. CITIZENS AGAINST NUCLEAR TRASH
 In 1989, the Louisiana Energy Services (LES)
conducted a nation wide search to find the “best” site to
build a privately owned uranium enrichment plant.
 The LES claimed to use an objective scientific method
to select Louisiana as the “best” place to build the
plant.
 In response to the selection, the communities of Homer,
Forest Grove and Center Springs that are nearby the
proposed site formed a group called Citizens against
Nuclear Trash (CANT).
 With the help of the Sierra Club Legal Defense Fund
(later changed to Earth Justice Legal Defense Fund),
CANT sued LES for practicing environmental racism.

18. CITIZENS AGAINST NUCLEAR TRASH
 Finally after 8 years, on May 1, 1997 a three-judge
panel of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s Atomic
Safety and Licensing Board made their final initial
decision.
 The panel found that racial bias did play a role in the
selection process. In response to the victory, on May 11,
1997 the London Times declared, “Louisiana Blacks
Win Nuclear War.” The courts decision was also
upheld on appeal on April 4, 1998.

19. HAZARDOUS EXPORT
 The export of hazardous waste to third world
countries is another growing concern.
 Between 1989 and 1994, an estimated 2,611
metric tons of hazardous waste was exported
from Organization for Economic Cooperation and
Development (OECD) countries to non-OECD
countries.

20. HAZARDOUS EXPORT
 Two international agreements were passed in
response to the growing exportation of hazardous
waste into their borders.
• Basal Convention
• Bamako Convention

21. BASAL CONVENTION
 The Basel Convention on the Control of Transboundary
Movements of Hazardous Wastes and their Disposal in
Africa and other parts of the developing world of
deposits of toxic wastes imported from abroad.
 (22 March 1989 in Basel, Switzerland)
 Its thrust at the time of its adoption was to combat the
“toxic trade”.
 The Convention entered into force in 1992.
 The objective was to protect human health and the
environment against the adverse effects of hazardous
wastes.
 29 articles

22. AIM OF BASAL
 the reduction of hazardous waste generation and the
promotion of environmentally sound management of
hazardous wastes
 the restriction of transboundary movements of
hazardous wastes except environmentally sound
management
 a regulatory system applying to cases where
transboundary movements are permissible.

23. BAMAKO CONVENTION
 It is a treaty of African nations prohibiting the import into
Africa of any hazardous (including radioactive) waste.
 The convention came into force in 1998
 The Bamako convention is a response to the Basel
convention.
 The failure of the Basel Convention to prohibit trade of
hazardous waste to less developed countries (LDCs)
 The realization that many developed nations were
exporting toxic wastes to Africa
 Negotiated by 12 nations of the African Union at
Bamako, Mali.
 To date: 29 Signatories, 25 Parties

24. PURPOSE OF BAMAKO
 Prohibit the import of all hazardous and radioactive
wastes into the African continent.
 Minimize and control transboundary movements of
hazardous wastes.
 Prohibit all ocean and inland water dumping or
incineration of hazardous wastes.
 Ensure that disposal of wastes is conducted in an
“environmentally sound manner ".
 Promote cleaner production of a permissible
emissions.

25. COMMITTEE FOR ENHANCING
ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE (CEEJ)
 The Honourable Chief Justice of Pakistan constituted
the Committee for Enhancing Environmental Justice
realising the need to debate, plan and take necessary
steps to enhance environmental justice in Pakistan.
 The Committee is the decision-making forum for
implementation of an initiative in environmental justice,
namely "Building Capacity for Environmental
Prosecution, Adjudication, Dispute Resolution,
Compliance and Enforcement in South Asia", funded
by the Asian Development Bank and implemented by
IUCN in Pakistan.

26. BHURBAN DECLARATION
 Organised by the IUCN, the two-day conference took
place on 24-25 March 2012 under the auspices of the
Supreme Court of Pakistan with support from the ADB
and UNEP.
 The challenge of sustainable development and
scarcity of natural resources are common to the whole
region, giving rise to similar environmental concerns.
 Bhurban Conference managed to provide the common
platform, much needed by the stakeholders to bring
urgent attention to these serious and complex issues.

27. Some of the
major decisions
include:
 Establishment of green benches at the
Supreme Courts of Pakistan and Azad Jammu
& Kashmir and all High Courts of Pakistan.
 The proposed constitutional amendment to
declare “Clean Environment” as a fundamental
human right in the Constitution of Pakistan.

28. OUR RESPONSIBILITY
• We should accept our responsibility
towards safe environment and strive
for better Legislations and Lawsuits.
• We should spread Awareness by
writing articles, making films and
posters about the issue before it turns
into Genocide.

29. CONCLUSION
Although awareness is spreading in Pakistan
also but more legislation must be passed for
preserving our rights to a sustainable and
clean environment. As even in today’s age we
are subject to several foreign forces exploiting
us by free trade of hazardous trash. It is time
that we speak to Environmental Racism.
THANK YOU! 