Did you know? The electronic devices we use every day represent half of the environmental impact of the ICT sector. Now more than ever, recycling mobile phones is an environmental imperative, and Orange plays its part. In particular in Africa, which is a key continent when it comes to giving devices a second life. How is this organized, what are the impacts and how can we contribute? Find out more.
Today, 80 % of the environmental impact of mobile devices is attributed to the manufacturing phase, but also when they reach their end of life. Why? Because when electric and electronic equipment becomes defunct, many of the components becomes waste (WEEE).
For this reason, Orange is committed to supporting several collection and recycling efforts in Africa.
Orange works with several very effective local partners in the field
The notion of a second life is an integral part of the African lifestyle: a telephone is repaired as many times as possible. However, in Africa and the Middle East, local repair shops rarely have an organized recycling center.
In this context, we support the second life approach by encouraging mobile phone repair shops and dealers to send their electronic waste to official collection and recycling channels. What’s more, we do everything we can to ensure this waste is taken care of responsibly.
The process is as follows
- People bring their old phones to the repair shop. What cannot be repaired is kept on site.
- Collection agents go to the repair shop to weigh, record, purchase and collect the waste.
- The waste is then taken to local workshops sponsored by Orange in partnership with the non-profit Emmaüs international, where it is reweighed, sorted and registered.
- The waste is packaged up by category and stored for shipment to France in containers.
- As soon as the waste arrives in France, waste management company Morphosis purchases and recycles it. Objective: extract the metal contained in the electronic components so they can be used to create new equipment and appliances.
Collecting end-of-life devices that contain precious raw materials is definitely everyone’s responsibility. It can only develop at scale if everyone plays their part.
All you have to do is drop off your device to your local registered repair shop or dealer.
You’ll also be helping to create jobs and preserve the environment.
Find out more about Orange’s commitment to collecting devices