So much waste

Waste management is the single most important function of civilisation. The moment we stop treating garbage and sewage, the cholera timer starts ticking, and we have only days before the disease sweeps through our settlements. The bigger the city, the bigger the problem. You can't really compost your way out of millions of households in a consumer society.

In many places, this is the core public service provided by local authorities, employing large numbers of public servants. Vienna's waste management department, MA 48, is a highly valued and trusted organisation, with beautifully organised recycling yards where people can come and pick up composted soil for their houseplants, dispose of larger items and even collect usable items. Vienna also has the funniest incinerator, designed by the superstar of playful architecture, Hundertwasser.

In less fortunate cases, private companies compete for these contracts, and often the mafia gets involved – the Camorra in Naples, Italy, for example. Waste is lucrative, but it's also quite dangerous. The collection, sorting and treatment of waste, especially municipal waste and hazardous materials, is a matter of life and death and potentially responsible for massive pollution: In 2022, the total waste generated by all economic activities and households in the EU was 2,233 million tonnes, or 4,999 kg per capita.

Of this, 9% is generated by households and 38% by the construction sector.

Although the European Union is determined to regulate its way out of these problems, it is still reluctant to get tough on industrial waste, which accounts for the vast majority of the problem materials. And the enforcement of these rules is left to the member states, which often evade or abuse these obligations.

They often chose to simply export the problem: European Union Member States sent more than 20 times more plastic waste to Turkey in 2020 than in 2016.

According to Eurostat, exports in 2021 amounted to 19.5 million tonnes, accounting for more than half (59%) of all waste exports from the EU. The main destination was Turkey, which received 13.1 million tonnes, 67% of all ferrous metal waste exported from the EU.

Guests

Pablo Sanchez Centellas is a representative of EPSU, the European Public Services Union, based in Brussels. EPSU influences the policies and decisions of employers, governments and European institutions that affect public service workers, their families and communities.

Petra Wintner is the carla project manager at Caritas Vienna. The carla shops are a hub for usable, intact goods donated by people who no longer need them. Women, men and entire families are provided with clothing, table and bed linen from this collection, and the long-term unemployed are given the opportunity to re-enter the labour market.

Orsolya Jeney is a human rights expert with a passion for upcycling. As the founder of Ursuslupus & Upcycling Productions, two Hungarian companies, I am dedicated to promoting the principles of a circular economy through the upcycling of discarded materials.

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Creative team

Réka Kinga Papp, editor-in-chief
Daniela Univazo Marquina, writer-editor
Merve Akyel, art director
Zeynep Feriha Demir, producer
Zsófia Gabriella Papp, digital producer

Management

Priyanka Hutschenreiter, project manager
Judit Csikós, financial manager
Csilla Nagyné Kardos, office administration
Maximilian Lehner, managing director

OKTO Crew

Senad Hergić, producer
Leah Hochedlinger, video recording
Marlena Stolze, video recording
Clemens Schmiedbauer, video recording
Richard Brusek, sound recording

Postproduction

Milán Golovics, dialogue editor
Dániel Nagy, dialogue editor
Nóra Ruszkai, video editor
István Nagy, post production

Art

Victor Maria Lima, animation
Music by Crypt-of-Insomnia

Captions and subtitles

Julia Sobota  closed captions, Polish and French subtitles; language versions management
Farah Ayyash  Arabic subtitles
Katalin Szlukovényi  Hungarian subtitles

Hosted by Kaffesatz at Gleis 21

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