United Nations Radio

The Basel Convention on the Control of Transboundary Movements of Hazardous Wastes and their Disposal has launched what it calls the PACE initiative.

PACE is the acronym for the Partnership for Action on Computing Equipment and will tackle the management of obsolete and used computers.

The launch of PACE is one of the outcomes of the ninth meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention which ended in Bali, Indonesia Friday.

PACE brings together the Secretariat of the Basel Convention, industry and civil society to establish methods to divert used and obsolete computers away from land disposal and burning into commercial recovery operations.

PACE will also develop technical guidelines for proper repair, refurbishing and recycling, including criteria for testing, labeling of refurbished computing equipment and certification of environmentally sound repair, refurbishment and recycling facilities.

The Basel Convention is an international treaty that regulates the global trade in hazardous waste and aims to minimize its generation and movement.

This is Donn Bobb reporting for United Nations Radio.

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