Global review of human waste-picking and its contribution to poverty alleviation and a circular economy

Waste pickers make a living by recovering, selling, or using for their own consumption recyclable materials found in open dumps and landfills, streets, canals, and rivers where MSW has been discarded (Medina 1997a). As mentioned earlier, the term—waste picker—was adopted at the First World Conference of waste pickers in Bogota Colombia in 2008 (WIEGO 2021c). A key aim of this conference was to facilitate global networking and to supplant derogatory terms like scavenger. Vultures and parasites are also other derogatory terms used to refer to people who collect waste for a living (Schenck et al 2012). Medina (2011a) pointed out that these people are known as scavengers, waste pickers or rag pickers in English speaking areas but also received different names depending on the local languages, or the place of their work, or the materials that they collected. Samson (2009a) has further suggested that the terms recyclers and waste pickers do not fully portray their work and included the term 'reclaimers' as they reclaim valuable materials from material considered to be waste. Some recyclers have embraced some of these names, but others have been rejected as pejorative. Table 3 presents a list of pejorative names from around the world.

In both developed and developing countries we see an increase in the number of waste pickers and there are similarities as well as differences in the reasons for this growth.

In developing countries such as Angola, Nigeria, Zimbabwe and Colombia factors responsible for people becoming informal waste pickers include poverty, social inequality, youth, economic constraints and limited job opportunities in the formal sector (International Labour Organization 2019a). Other strong factors relate to lack of parental care which forces some young people to become waste pickers (Afon 2012). In Pakistan and Afghanistan, children are sent by their parents to dumpsite areas to collect and sell MSW thereby, contributing to the household income (Shehzad 2014).

Government policy is also crucial. For example, in Nigeria Muktar (2010) indicated that policies failed the youth who were considered to be future leaders and did not provide the necessary protection, and consequently there was an increasing trend that they started earning their livelihood from recovering materials from a range of sources. In Zambia, the local government revised the National Development Plan to incorporate emerging issues such as creating jobs and inclusiveness that can help reinforce sustainable development efforts. Hence, young waste pickers, typically being deprived, should benefit from these government policies and strategies, which aim to increase jobs opportunities (Chileshe and Moonga 2017). Muktar (2010) stated that at the political level the uncompromising stance of the economy and government's unfavourable policies towards youth, particularly in most developing nations, force them to become waste pickers to meet their basic needs and also to enhance their standing in society. According to Sasaki et al (2014) waste pickers may also be attracted to entering the informal recycling system as there are opportunities for people who have limited skills.

Climate change and urbanization are also identified as emerging factors in the growth of waste pickers. Urbanization in Zambia has created a large number of unemployed and underemployed residents with few alternative means of earning a livelihood, particularly for residents with no education (Chileshe and Moonga 2017). In India, waste pickers are often rural immigrants coming to cities but are unable to find skilled jobs, e.g. in a garment factory (Medina 1997b, Rathana 2009). In the Philippines, rapid urbanization also increased the number of informal workers, e.g. waste pickers, due to the accumulation of human capital, the sectoral and regional distributions of the population, and sectoral and regional income inequalities (Yuki 2007). Michael et al (2019) observed that impacts of climate change, rural poverty, crop failure and starvation are some of the factors that have driven displacement, potentially contributing to the growing number of waste pickers in urban areas in India.

Material recovery by waste pickers in developing countries occurs in a wide variety of locations such as picking from bags placed on the kerbside for collection, waste bins on the streets, as well as dumps and landfills (Medina 2010). Waste pickers also recover materials such as steel rods from demolished buildings, and sometimes buildings that were destroyed during war, such as in Beirut, Lebanon (Medina 1997b). This is very different from materials recovered in the United States and other industrialized countries. In these countries aluminium cans have historically constituted the most common material recovered by waste pickers (Downs and Medina 2000). Waste pickers also recover organic materials for use as fertilizer for crops and or as feed for livestock (Medina 1997b, Afon 2012). Waste picking activity supplies secondary materials largely to either artisans or industry in Senegal, Kenya and Pakistan (Medina 1997b). The common examples include scrap metal, glass, paper, plastics, food leftover, old appliances, and old mattresses (Medina 2011b).

Another source is war waste, often found in Africa but not confined to the continent. O'Neill (2019) pointed out that the armed conflict, particularly in Africa has considerably contributed to the large amount of war waste generation. For example, in Angola, a large amount of war waste remains are spread widely in the country due to the long civil war that ended in 2002 (Aceria de Angola 2005). Despite the enormous damage that the war has caused, the resulting waste has valuable materials for recovery, e.g. copper, iron and steel, and aluminium.

Although waste picking is principally carried out in developing countries, waste picking also occurs at a smaller scale in developed countries. But in developed countries, waste picking activities are different as they are less driven by poverty (International Labour Organization 2019b). A study carried out by Chileshe and Moonga (2017) highlighted that in developed countries, a series of factors, such as changes in local government policy, has driven the demand for informal recycling. As a result of increased MSW generation, this has resulted in declining space in landfills, new recycling technologies, and the push from environmentalists for political actions towards environmental protection of the earth. Another set of factors includes changes in economic conditions in industrialised countries, which results in losses of manufacturing jobs, cutbacks to government employment and a rollback of the welfare state in developed countries (Chileshe and Moonga 2017).

Waste pickers' revenues are intrinsically linked to the type of material they can recover from waste (Asim et al 2012). The most popular recyclable MSW products that are collected by the waste pickers include paper, cardboard boxes, plastic bottles, as well as scrap metal (Schenck et al 2012). For example, in poor countries such as Nicaragua, waste pickers earn USD1.50 to USD2 per day, which is below the World Bank's poverty line. While in Brazil, the municipality has invested in a landfill plant in Managua, creating cooperatives so that waste pickers have access to the new landfill (Marello and Helwege 2018). Gender also impacts on revenue, for example women waste pickers are still limited in their collection of metals and plastics, particularly aluminium cans, from these waste streams because of work conditions (Marello and Helwege 2018).

Many African countries have become receivers of a large amount of MSW from developed nations (Lubick 2012). O'Neill (2000) affirmed that about 1 million tonnes, which corresponds to 5%–10% of hazardous waste generated by developed countries, was sent to the poorer countries in Africa. Sridhar and Hammed (2016) also asserted that high importation of used electrical and electronical equipment, second-hand vehicles and other metal containing commodities has resulted in an increased rate of metal scrap generation in Africa (Van Beers & Graedel 2003) with imported second-hand vehicles one of the major sources of metal scrap in Africa (Sridhar and Hammed 2016). Each vehicle on average contains 75% iron and steel, and 2% of non-ferrous metals (Sridhar and Hammed 2016). The UNEP (2018) highlighted that countries in Africa have been flooded with second hand goods and some of these goods are already obsolete or close to the end of life on arrival.

This export of second hand goods can be used as a strategy to circumvent regulations governing MSW disposal and transboundary movements in order to get rid of MSW products at low cost (UNEP 2018). An example is China's 2017 ban on plastic waste importation. Plastic waste importation typically happens when developed nations cannot fully get rid of their plastic waste generated in a short time, and their domestic recycling markets are not yet fully constructed and consequently they export to developing nations (Wen et al 2021). Many African countries often have no capacity and/or infrastructure to manage and dispose of these products and they end up as waste in open dumpsites as well as landfills (UNEP 2018).

However the focus on end-of-life device dumping in Africa and negative impacts on health and environmental hazard is not the whole story. Grant and Oteng-Ababio (2016) argue that in Ghana e-waste transformation and its role in the circular economy has been overlooked with imported e-waste refined before being reintroduced into production. Materials were separated, aggregated, and then reincorporated into the production as a new device, often again to another international location typically illegally (Pickren 2014). Theses trades was made by Ghanaian scrap dealers who understood the e-waste trade market, often living in Europe and the United States to facilitate these trades, and profited from their knowledge of international trading (Grant and Oteng-Ababio 2012). Similar trends can be seen in second hand clothes (Minter 2019).

The COVID-19 pandemic has impacted the informal economy. Many lost jobs and suffered severe income losses during lockdowns while also facing health hazards as their work entails high health risks including exposure to medical waste (WIEGO 2022b). Dias et al (2020) mentioned that COVID-19 had a considerable impact on recyclable sales because of the fall in commodity prices and consumer spending. Further, COVID-19 impacted waste pickers lives particularly women due to a rise in domestic violence during the pandemic (Dias et al 2020). Consequently, increased mental health problems among those women affected their wellbeing.

While COVID-19 has had considerably impact, the resilience of the informal sector was also exemplified during this crisis (Tucker and Anantharaman 2020). Pitoyo et al (2020) stated that the informal sector becomes a path for people who lose their jobs or incomes during the macroeconomic crisis as the informal sector has flexibility for accommodating capital and human resources during a crisis. During the COVID-19 crisis, the informal sector acts as a safety net for laid-off workers (Pitoyo et al 2020).

Singh (2021) has made the connection between the circular economy and the integration of the informal sector and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) in a review of waste picking in Mumbai, Bengaluru and Pune. His paper argues that the SDGs could provide a useful frame for understanding waste pickers. For example, waste pickers' work provides an opportunity for the poor to generate income and sustain their families helping alleviate poverty (SDG1) Likewise Singh (2021) states the women are likely to play an important role in waste picking activity and this provides an opportunity for women to be economically empowered helping with gender equality (SDG5). However, there are also negative aspects, such as informal workers working in unhealthy conditions, limited access to banking, working long hours, and others (Srinivas 2020, Singh 2021). In terms of SDG 11, Sustainable cities and communities, the services provided by waste pickers make cities more sustainable by reducing the risk of waterlogging and flooding, as well as reduced costs associated with MSW management by the urban local authorities.

The work done by waste pickers is important in societies with less developed states as it provides environmental benefits, prevents MSW from accumulating in dumpsites and enables raw materials to be delivered at low cost back to industry (Vázquez 2013).

Uddin and Gutberlet (2018) emphasise that informal recycling activities done by waste pickers build natural assets, by recovering resources for material recycling. In addition, waste pickers' overall performance can help to protect the environment (Navarrete-Hernández and Navarrete-Hernández 2018), contributing to resources conservation, improved resource recovery and closing the resources loop in the circular economy (Uddin and Gutberlet 2018). Waste pickers are service providers in an environmental system as they help to reduce air pollution, prevent water contamination and reduce the need to build more landfills which take up valuable space (Mphaka and Moja 2017). This has a direct relationship with SDGs 13 (Climate action) and 14 (Life below water) and is considered as an approach for ecosystem restoration as waste pickers work helps to reduce MSW streams. This also can result in (indirect) reduction of greenhouse gases emissions (Burneo et al 2020), thus helping to achieve various SDG targets, in particular in the context of current climate change discussions (Uddin and Gutberlet 2018, Singh 2021).

Collection of recyclable materials through the informal sector also contributes to environmental health and sustainability (Sembiring and Nitivattananon 2010). Paul et al (2012) asserted that MSW collecting and recycling activities through the informal sector reduces environmental contamination caused by uncollected MSW and the propagation of disease carriers such as rats and flies. As a result, water-induced diseases and illnesses, such as malaria and dengue, which can particularly threaten children, can be reduced. Recycling activities also contribute to environmental sustainability by making secondary raw materials available for the production of new products (Paul et al 2012). As waste pickers also help with increasing the recovery of materials from dumpsites and landfills, they also contribute to the sustainability of virgin resources as environmental agents (Oguntoyinbo 2012). For example, waste pickers greatly contributed to improving the environment of Abidjan's population by helping decrease the number of illegal transfer stations or dumpsites through MSW recovering and reducing the environmental risks associated with the accumulation of MSW on streets (Andrianisa and Brou 2016). Also waste pickers work contributes to protecting the environment by increasing the amount of materials recycled or reprocessed in the society, which can be argued as an important reason to legitimise their work (Dinler 2016).

However, the informal sector is commonly associated with an unhygienic environment and practices (Sembiring and Nitivattananon 2010). Paul et al (2012) argues that informal recycling often results in environmental problems, for example through the contamination of land and water by leachate discharge. Moreover, women and children are exposed for prolonged periods to toxic, hazardous and infectious materials from MSW streams, thereby resulting in considerable secondary social and health costs (Paul et al 2012). In a written public statement regarding waste pickers in the streets, Fatih Hatipoğlu, the head of the Directorate of Health Affairs in the Ankara metropolitan municipality, claimed that his agency has started a war against illegal waste hunters who were tearing bin bags and creating a threat to the environment (Dinler 2016). Andrianisa and Brou (2016) mentioned that due to waste pickers lack of education, poor practices such as MSW disposal outside of the legal places, and/or direct stripping of MSW on the ground at the transfer stations could contaminate soil and aquifers.

Chi et al (2011) highlighted also that informal e-waste recycling is associated with serious environmental issues due to the use of primitive handling methods to extract e-waste components such as power supplies, compressors, processors and capacitors. Cruvinel et al (2020) point out that around the Estructural dumpsite in Brazil, there is a large area of environmental degradation, which is exacerbated by social conflict from the construction of shanty houses occupied by waste pickers.

The circular economy has received considerable attention of scholars, governments and citizens and it is an important step for sustainable development (Kirchherr et al 2018, Korhonen et al 2018, Corona et al 2019, Bender and Bilotta 2020). The circular economy refers to an economic system that replaces the 'end-of-life' concept with reducing, reusing, recycling and recovery of materials in the production, distribution and consumption processes. It also refers to simultaneous creation of environmental quality, economic prosperity and social equity, for the benefit of current and future generations, enabled by novel business models and responsible consumers (Gall et al 2020).

As waste pickers provide the vital and basic service of collecting MSW in places where the formal recycling sector is absent or highly ineffective (Agunwamba 2003), they contribute to turning waste into a resource and therefore contribute to increasing resource efficiency and closing the loop in a circular economy through reuse, recovery and recycling processes (Scarlat and Dallemand 2019). Johansson (2016) indicated that one way to increase recycling would be to focus on metals stocks often neglected in discussions about resource availability and the circular economy, since landfills and dumpsites have a great resource potential. For example, globally the amount of copper metal lost to the environment is estimated to be comparable with current in-use stocks. Recovery of these lost metals, e.g. from landfills, would increase the flows of secondary resources and thereby replace a share of the primary production (Johansson 2016). However, the question of how much metal could be found and recovered from landfills and dumpsites in the developing countries remains largely unanswered (Graedel et al 2011). Waste pickers have thus been playing an important role in bringing lost valuable resources back into the economy, thus contributing to the circular economy at different levels, e.g. 'social, economic, and environmental' (Gall et al 2020, p 2)

Waste pickers' contribution to reducing waste volumes in landfills, water courses, illegal dumping sites and MSW burning in open areas is considerable (Colombijn and Morbidini 2017, Marello and Helwege 2018) as can be seen in table 4. For example, in Zingwangwa, Malawi, waste pickers recover a substantial amount of plastics, up to 20 kg per day, while metal waste pickers can recover about 30 kg of metals per day (Kasinja and Tilley 2018). Similarly in Nuevoz Laredo in México waste pickers recover about 20 kg of aluminium cans and cardboard per day, and in Zimbabwe waste pickers recover about 6%–10% of MSW deposited at the final disposal site which is about 27–50 tons per day (Ferronato and Torretta 2019). The role of waste pickers in megacities such as Jakarta is significant with 37 000 waste pickers recovering about 25% of the city's MSW which corresponds to 378 000 tonnes per year (Medina 2008). In Brazil, waste pickers are also responsible for about 90% of the Brazilian MSW recycling (Ribeiro 2016). The same occurs in Tunisia where 8000 waste pickers known as 'barbechas' collect for recycling, about 5000 out of the 8400 tonnes per year of PET (polyethylene terephthalate) plastic, while in Brazil waste pickers are responsible for the country's high recycling rates for cardboard (about 80%) and aluminium (92%)).

Waste pickers could be actively involved in the politics of Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) through the climate change negotiations. Since 2009 civil society participation in the CDM has considerably increased and diversified (Ciplet 2014). For example, the government in South Africa is trying to create collaboration efforts between state and civil society to contested issues of using incineration to burn waste. To help achieve this, they are trying to understand better and recognize the role of waste pickers who provide considerable waste collection and embrace the national-to-international waste business/state capital relations especially linked to CDM (Kruger et al 2019). CDM gives waste pickers the opportunity to highlight the importance of their work by its contribution to reducing greenhouse gas emissions through diverting waste from incineration and dumping (O'Neill 2019). As a result, waste pickers contribution have been recognised as 'unsung heroes' in the fight against climate change (Ciplet 2014).

There are several common characteristics associated with waste pickers (Medina 1997b, 1997c, Afon 2012):

• Waste pickers have a low ascribed social status and suffer from stigma.
• Waste pickers work in poor conditions and are exposed to health and safety risks.
• Waste picking is a typically informal sector activity.
• Waste pickers are in situations of extreme poverty.
• Scavenging through waste picking is an adaptive response to chronic poverty in developing countries.

From our literature review of 45 articles published between 1994 and 2022 from 27 different countries, we have identified which of these articles refer to the first four of the above characteristics, namely, health risk; poverty; stigma and informality—refer to in table 5. This analysis shows that 75% of the articles cover three or more of the common characteristics above.

Figure 6 shows how waste pickers are widespread around the world. Waste pickers in low-middle-income countries (orange colour) such as Angola, Bangladesh, Cameroon, Côte d'Ivoire, Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria, Nicaragua, Mongolia, Pakistan, Palestine, Philippines, Zimbabwe face serious difficulties due to waste pickers continuing to working informally. As a result, waste pickers have no or less access to social protection. Some upper middle-income countries (yellow colour) have successful examples where the government formally recognises waste pickers' work (e.g. Brazil and Colombia) and Chile is another country taking a path to achieve this goal. Also, waste pickers in Indonesia are successfully integrated into policies, and Indian waste pickers have received more social protection. Some are taking a step to reach this goal, including South Africa, Ecuador, Botswana (blue colour). In other countries (light blue), including China, Thailand, Turkey and Russia, waste pickers remain to be seen and are considered a discriminated group in the eyes of the state and population. The waste pickers situation is worse in low-income countries (green) such as Ethiopia, Guinea‐Bissau, Mozambique, Malawi, and Uganda, since waste pickers belong to the poorest strata of the population with health risk conditions resulting from informality. Table 5 is the summary of figure 6.

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The remainder of this section will present findings from the literature related to health and safety risk, poverty, and stigma, which are all social impacts that can directly affect waste pickers as individuals or as family groups. As the aspects of informality and its benefits and limitations require a broader ranging discussion (including governance approaches), this is presented in section 6.

Before discussing the characteristics related to health and safety risk, poverty, and stigma, there is a section on waste work in a global context. This section provides a useful framing on the study of waste, ahead of the more specific analysis on waste picker characteristics.

Waste has always been an abject part of human beings' daily lives since their existence. Ain (2015) referred to abjection as a social and psychological process by which things such as waste, sewage, corpses, and rotting food elicit powerful emotional responses such as horror and disgust. In the past decades, with modernisation along with production and consumption patterns, more waste was generated (Moore 2009). Moore (2009) elucidated that waste has escalated across interdisciplinary boundaries into social science, humanities, and anthropology. The anthropological perspective on waste explores the fact that what constitutes waste is a highly subjective notion (Drackner 2005). This raises a question, do we necessarily know what waste is to whom? To answer this question, Resnick (2015) and Schröder et al (2019) stated that despite waste being a potential resource, one man's waste is another man's treasure and source of income. In the context of modernising cities, waste is mostly perceived and represented as an urban order and public and environmental health issue (Moore 2009).

Today, when waste becomes visible, it exposes the inherent instability of modern divisions between clean and dirty and the dysfunction of institutions created to police those divisions (Fredericks 2018). In this context, waste becomes an effective political tool through which citizens can demand their rights to the city as it increases an expectation of cleanliness (Moore 2009). For example, in Dakar, the waste workers joined a chorus of strikers in the municipal sector and other citizens such as youth rappers and street vendors to demand more inclusive citizenship through negotiations (Fredericks 2018). Political inclusion is complex, in the sense, rather than sorting out capitalism's waste crisis, recycling and other environmental solutions shift capital's contradictions from nature onto labour in important ways because recycling conserves natural resources and reduces landfill emissions (Dauvergne and LeBaron 2013, Tucker and Anantharaman 2020), although it often comes at the cost of injuries, diseases, and premature death for waste pickers (Dauvergne and LeBaron 2013). Pacheco-Vega and Parizeau (2018) emphasised that this relational nature of human-waste interaction and humans' vulnerability to health issues within the informal sector were essential in understanding the potential risks that waste pickers face in their daily lives.

The informal waste work in the Global South is widely compared against the Global North. The Global North remains associated with waste picking work done by migrants in a situation of social exclusion (Porras Bulla et al 2021). These authors further argue that the reason why informal waste picking work received little attention and academic debate regarding the environmental and socio-economic benefits is because of stigma and delay to formalise the informal waste work into the formal system in the Global North (Porras Bulla et al 2021). The Global North typically tends to prioritise waste management through public policies that are the regulations and laws implemented by the government, which often prohibit informal work in contrast to social policies where the government needs to respond to people's needs such as food, housing, healthcare, employment, and among other necessities. Yet few policies can recognise the environmental benefits from informal waste work and formalising waste picking workers into the social fabric. Despite the existence of informal waste picking work in the Global North being denied, e.g. in Europe, it is interesting to note the growth and conflicts in waste picking, enhanced by migratory flows and economic crises (Scheinberg et al 2016). Moreover, these conflicts permit more social and political visibility for waste pickers in the MSW management system.

MSW management systems in the Global North are more centralised and technologically modernised with large public budgets, leaving little room for informal waste activities. At the same time, these systems seem to be hitting certain limits when it comes to meeting their recycling and reuse goals, thus giving opportunity for alternative models inspired by the ways of waste pickers (Zimring 2015). For example, the increased number of immigrants from the Global South to the Global North, such as the United States and Europe, increased MSW disposal. It also increased both private and public services related to sanitation, with emigrants being involved in waste work, e.g. waste picking (Zimring 2015). Nagle (2013) added that waste workers such as sanitation workers provide essential public services and make the global economy hum without hiccups despite the negative impacts on their lives and invisibility of their services.

There are assumptions that wastes always travel to poorer countries or cheapest labour markets, but the reality is more complex. In the past, e-waste was exported from the United States to South China and disassembled in infamously unsafe workshops, giving a bad reputation to China as the world's electronic wastebasket (Minter 2016). Today's reality is different. As Minter (2016) pointed out, e-waste travels from developing to developing countries such as from Indonesia to India and Kenya. Moreover, it is easy to find used Chinese phones for sale in Nairobi or Delhi (Minter 2016). Some e-waste transportation is likely done illegally by criminal networks or companies that avoid tax and export/import duties (Minter 2013). On the other hand, a new perspective to e-waste movement from developed to developing countries can be considered as it allows for developing countries to repair and reuse end-of-life products, providing a source of income source rather than waste dumping (Lepawsky 2015).

In the developing world, the environmental issues associated with open dumpsites areas are typically a source of various communicable and non-communicable diseases, which affects those people who work in or are involved with waste picking activities (Hunt 1996). These environmental issues include various hazardous and toxic wastes, such as electric and electronic waste which contains heavy metals (e.g. mercury, arsenic and cadmium). These pose a direct negative impact on the health of people who are involved in waste picking activities (Gutberlet and Uddin 2017). These different environmental issues produce strong odours and are a breeding ground for rodents, cockroaches, flies and other insects which can transmit diseases to waste pickers (Chileshe and Moonga 2017).

As the COVID-19 crisis continues, it negatively influences waste pickers' health in developing countries. This is especially evident in Africa, where MSW is not well managed since different types of MSW are mixed together, including hospital waste (Carenbauer 2021). It impacts waste pickers' health as they collect recyclable materials in different waste streams, often being in direct contact with discarded and contaminated hospital waste (WIEGO 2022b). Consequently, this exposes waste pickers to COVID-19 (Dias 2020), and also puts their family health and lives at risk (WIEGO 2022b).

There are various reported examples of these health risks resulting from different environmental issues. In dumpsites in Ibadan in Nigeria, waste pickers are exposed to health risks from toxic materials, chemical waste, hospital waste such as contaminated needles, heavy metals from batteries and broken bottles and other sharp objects (Awopetu et al 2014). In Guinea-Bissau, West Africa, waste pickers are exposed to serious health risks from the burning of hazardous and biomedical waste (Ferrari et al 2016). In Addis Ababa, Ethiopia waste pickers face potential health risks due to accumulation of polluted water which provides a breeding ground for mosquitoes and attract flies as well as vermin (Mohammed and Elias 2017). In Kampala in Uganda, waste pickers are exposed to the prevalence of flies on the landfills which transmit bacteria diseases such as typhoid, cholera and dysentery (Kimbugwe and Ibitayo 2014). In the Gaza Strip in Palestine, waste pickers complained of intestinal diseases e.g. diarrhoea, constipation, and blood with stool and others face health problems such as back pains, breathing issues, skin diseases, sore throats, and coughing with a high temperature (Al-Khatib et al 2020).

Children waste pickers can be particularly vulnerable to catching diseases such as typhoid fever, malaria, tuberculosis, cholera which sometimes can be mortal (Hunt 2001, Downmore et al 2011, International Solid Waste Association 2016a, 2016b, Iheanacho et al 2018). Similar health issues occur in China as e-waste is extensively recycled by waste pickers into the informal sector due to the high demand for second hand electronic equipment and thus putting their health at risk (Chi et al 2011). To avoid the impacts of landfill environmental issues, governments in Argentina, the West Bank and Azerbaijan have constructed new sanitary landfills that meet high safety and environmental standards (Gutberlet and Uddin 2017, Kaza and Yao 2018). Also proper training is needed for appropriate management, storage, transportation, disassembly and sorting of material to guarantee waste pickers safety and health (Ghisolfi et al 2017).

The significant environmental issues that can occur in areas where waste pickers work can and do have serious, and sometimes life threatening, consequences. These health impacts affect their livelihood as well as personal circumstances such as being unable to seek medical assistance given that waste pickers typically live in extremely poverty as discussed in the following sub-section.

A common characteristic of waste pickers is that they live in a situation of extreme poverty which is characterized by income and resource instability, job insecurity, weak provision of social welfare, and creates difficulties in envisioning and planning for the future (Fieulaine and Apostolidis 2015). Most recovered materials such as plastics and scrap metals are bought from waste pickers at low prices and sold at higher prices due to market fair price as shown in the figure 7 below.

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In Kinshasa in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, waste pickers remain poor due to high unemployment levels, deteriorations in the formal job market, increased levels of political instability, corruption and institutional and policy constraints in MSW management (Simatele and Etambakonga 2015). In Nakuru in Kenya, waste pickers are the poorest and most vulnerable residents, and their income is under Kshs. 5000 or less than USD2 per day (Lubaale and Nyang'oro 2013). Waste pickers in Delhi are often the poorest of the poor and they live on the edge of society not just from their work but the implication of their lower caste status. This has been further complicated by the circumstances created by COVID-19 (Majithia 2020). In Delhi in India, waste pickers earn about half of the minimum wage or USD1.35 per day, and waste collectors earn about the minimum wage of USD2.50 per day (Uiterkamp et al 2011). In a later publication Ravindra et al (2016) indicated that waste pickers in Delhi earn a lower wage of USD0.68 to USD1.09 per day while waster pickers in Chandigarh earn slightly more at USD1.36 per day. However, during the five years between these publications the Indian Rupee dropped about 30% compared with the US dollar (Pritam 2022). In essence, the wages remained about the same, if not slightly higher, in the local currency.

Examples from across Africa illustrate the way waste pickers become trapped in a vicious circle of poverty which in turn limits their educational and livelihood opportunities. In Accra in Ghana, waste pickers have low education and employment skills which excludes them from obtaining formal employment, hence they become involved in the waste picking sector (Rockson et al 2013). Waste pickers in South Africa have very low levels of education which leave them with few marketable skills and or little prospect to be able to compete for formal employment (Schenck and Blaauw 2011). In Tanzania recycling activities are done by people without education such as waste pickers and without initiatives to promote sustainable recycling practices, waste pickers cannot improve their skills and help increase their productivity (Uiterkamp et al 2011). This issue is similar in Douala in Cameroon, waste pickers have a low socio-economic status as they are migrants from rural to urban areas with low or no academic background and limited skills who often opt for waste picking as a veritable option for income generation and livelihood (Mbeng 2013).

However, in some countries waste pickers are not in extreme poverty. In Dar es Salaam in Tanzania waste pickers earned about USD108 average per month which is 40% higher than the national minimum wage in Tanzania for formal employment (Palfreman 2015). In Bantar Gebang in Indonesia, the average monthly income of waste pickers was about USD216 which was equivalent to the minimum wage in Jakarta in 2013 (Sasaki et al 2014). These findings aligned with Samson (2009a) that despite waste pickers' income being very low, they were not necessarily always the poorest in the society. There were however significant differences based on gender. For example, in Brasilia in Brazil, female waste pickers have a lower income of about USD170 monthly compared with male waste pickers of about USD220 monthly (Marques et al 2021).

The impact of COVID-19 around the world has also affected the poverty level of waste pickers (Majithia 2020, Samson 2020). A report by WIEGO (2021a) highlighted that waste pickers depend on their essential daily earnings but stopped working to stay at home due to COVID-19 exacerbating household poverty. In addition, they often live in informal, crowded settlements without running water and sanitation (WIEGO 2021d). For example in South Africa since the lockdown from COVID-19 the government asked waste pickers to stay at home which has impacted their livelihoods (Harrisberg 2020). In India waste pickers were not allowed to operate during the lockdown, and they have been left on their own with no support in regard to their livelihood (Chen 2020).

A study carried out by Uddin and Gutberlet (2018) affirmed that the poverty that waste pickers face means more than lack of income and resources and is manifested through hunger or malnutrition. Poverty that waste pickers face has many facets such as limited access to education, healthcare and other basic services e.g. water, electricity and sanitation (Gutberlet and Uddin 2017).

The prevalence of poverty is complex, and as shown above it is attributed to various factors including minimum wage, education, welfare spending and unemployment. But underlying all of this, is that waste pickers work in surroundings that have significant and serious negative environment impacts, as well as health and safety risks. This not only has a strong contribution to their living in poverty but also a distinctive and acute social stigma.

The term stigma refers to a social and/or individual attribute that is devalued and discredited in a particular social context (Kusow 2007). In many developing countries, stigma associated with waste picking partly stems from the historical perception of informal work as a social evil linked to criminality (Wellings and Sutcliffe 1984). This is despite the fact that in some parts of the world waste pickers are seen as playing a valuable role and they make good income (Borges et al 2019).

Local governments often tend to assume that people, such as waste pickers, engage in illicit drug abuse as a means for generating income (Chvatal 2010). Waste pickers are stereotyped by the public as being poor and inferior (Perez 2019), jobless people and homeless and to be avoided because the public sees the activity that waste pickers are doing as dirty work (Sentime 2014). Waste pickers are also generally viewed incorrectly as a 'lost tribe' consisting of social misfits (Samson 2010). Allen and Jossias (2011) agreed that waste pickers are still being treated as criminals, failures and useless people by civil society, when in fact they are ordinary people who treat MSW as a resource (Rogerson 2001). For example, in Buenos Aires in Argentina, a 49 year old male waste picker stated that 'citizens feel really important and more clean, while we are the dirty ones, but it is not like that because we are ordinary people like them, only because they have an extra peso in their pocket they are not more than us we are all the same and human beings' (Parizeau 2015).

Perez (2019) stated that even some security companies often warn their customers that waste pickers are the 'eyes and ears' of criminals. In some situations, discrimination and exclusion of waste pickers prevents them for accessing MSW in wealthy neighbourhoods (Marello 2013). In many residential areas, people often try to prevent waste pickers from accessing their bins which contribute to an overall mistrust towards waste pickers in various African affluent suburbs areas (Perez 2019). Without MSW access, the livelihood of waste pickers can be severely disrupted, and their primary needs of subsistence is taken away (Scheinberg 2011, Demaria and Todt 2020). As a result, waste pickers' knowledge, expertise and the pivotal role that their play in recycling economy is often dismissed (Samson et al 2020).

Stigma faced by disadvantaged people, like the waste picking communities, prevents them from accessing social and economic capital such as income, education, well-being, housing and health (Makki and van Vuuren 2017). As a result, stigmatisation can cause social disorder, such as increasing the rate of criminality, drug abuse, alcoholism, unhygienic living conditions, poor individual health, unemployment and dependence on social welfare. There are many examples of this around the world. In Bandung in Indonesia, waste pickers are seen as dirty, disgusted, sick, squalor and perceived as a nuisance, a symbol of backwardness and even as criminals (Sembiring and Nitivattananon 2010). The same issue is similar in the capital city of Ankara in Turkey where people look at waste pickers as vagabonds and as potential criminals (Dinler 2016). In Delhi in India waste pickers are also rejected due to a perceived lack of cleanliness and hygiene (Majithia 2020). This similarity occurs in dumps of León in Nicaragua where waste pickers suffer heavy social stigmatization and their work is marginalized (Vázquez 2013). Waste pickers in Lahore Pakistan have the same problem where they face abuse, insults and harassment not only by police but also by the Solid Waste Management Department officials who take bribes from them (Andrianisa and Brou 2016). Likewise, in Kisumu in Kenya waste pickers also face stigma from the general population despite some residents recognising that they are helping collect MSW in the city (Kain et al 2015).

A study carried out by Marello (2013) stated that waste pickers struggled to improve their living standard and develop their business due to the existing model of waste picking since it is limited in scope and scale. Limitation in scope is caused by social stigmatization, discrimination and economic exploitation while limitation in scale is related to lack of necessary capital and technology support to increase MSW collection as well as sustain a profitable business (Akeju 2020). Moreover, discrimination and low social status leads to further harassment and humiliation and additionally diminishes their own self‐esteem.

These three cascading factors associated with waste pickers—health impacts, poverty, and stigma—lead to the inevitable questions on how to improve their livelihoods and lives in general and whether a more formal sector would help alleviate these issues.

Today, globally there is a considerable informal sector in municipal waste management particularly in developing nations where formal selective collection systems for recyclable materials are not well established (Wilson et al 2009). Hence, due to economic difficulties informal activities continue to increase and where imported raw materials are expensive (Wilson et al 2015). Nevertheless, the inclusion of the informal economy into the formal MSWM system remains a challenge in many developing countries (Zurbrugg 2003). Most recovered materials such as metals are recycled and recovered throughout the informal sector due to its predominance and activity as shown in the figure 8.

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Figure 8 above describes a simplified system that represents the value chain in the informal economy. The structure represents specific cases in China, Brazil, India, Nigeria and similar other structures occur worldwide. Waste pickers collect metals e.g. aluminium, aluminium cans, steel, bronze, lead and copper from households, open dumpsites, bins, landfills to sell these valuable recyclable materials. Waste pickers can be organized or work alone with and/or without income and all along the value chain from collecting metals to the trading points. At trading points recovered metals are sold to the middlemen, who then transport and supply these secondary recyclable materials directly to the formal recycling industries that utilize it as raw materials for local uses e.g. construction and infrastructure as well as selling to recycling industries abroad. Similar structures are recognized in many case studies within the scientific literature (Egun 2012, Ezeah et al 2013, Souza 2013, Rutkowski and Rutkowski 2015, Steuer et al 2018, O'Neill 2019). de Oliveira et al (2012) suggested that inclusion of waste pickers to promote recyclable and reusable materials is crucial due to the shared responsibility for the product life cycle. Zurbrugg (2003) added that recovery and recycling of materials, e.g. metals, typically takes place in all elements of the system and is widely practised in the informal economy by waste pickers for income. Given waste pickers deal with recyclable materials implies that there is a detailed model of recycling actors at final disposal sites, and waste pickers are already making contribution to the informal recycling system (Sasaki and Araki 2013).

Wilson et al (2009) affirmed that the social inclusion of informal recycling is helping waste pickers as they lack social assets. Dias (2016), Omotoso (2017), and WIEGO (2021b) highlight that waste pickers' social inclusion can help through their participation in the design and implementation of an MSW management. They conclude that the preferred option is integrating the informal recycling into MSWM plans.

The International Labour Organization defines the informal economy in MSWM system as individuals or small and micro-enterprises that intervene in MSW management without being registered and without being formally charged with providing MSW management service (Singh 2021). Two billion workers, representing 61.2% of the world's employed population, are in informal employment (International Labour Organization 2019c). A report by (WIEGO 2020a) shows that according to International Labour Organization about 15–20 million persons worldwide earn their living from recycling MSW (WIEGO 2022a). The size of the informal economy has been growing worldwide (Martha Alter Chen 2012), with more and more people around the world being informally employed (Roever 2020). Informal workers do not have social protections that help to improve income, protect against health and safety risks, and alleviate poverty.

Chen (2005) says that the largest occupational categories in the informal economy in most developing countries are casual day labourers in agriculture and construction, small farmers, street vendors, domestic workers, workers in small, unregistered factories and industrial outworkers who work from their homes (also called homeworkers). Other categories of informal employment common to both developed and developing countries are casual workers in restaurants and hotels, sub-contracted janitors, security guards and gardeners as well as temporary office helpers or off-site data processors (Chen 2005).

Vanek et al (2014) claim that the informal economy plays an important role in creating job opportunities, income generation and poverty reduction in many countries particularly these developing and transition countries. The informal economy has been developing as a response to economic depression and has provided a source of income to households that have lost their formal jobs (Galdino et al 2018).

An International Labour Organization report (International Labour Organization 2019c) points out that waste pickers, who have been previously employed in other sectors or who have never been employed, are working outside of the formal labour force as a result of lack of enough job opportunities. These informal workers—waste pickers—include women, children, elderly people and or migrants (The World Bank 2018a). For example in Botswana the rate of unemployment is considered high due to lack of jobs opportunities, which was estimated to be about 17.6% according to the national unemployment in 2016 and based on USD1 a day poverty line, forcing many people to also rely on the informal economy (Gaetsewe 2018). Today these workers in the informal economy have received global support for example from Women in Informal Employment: Globalizing and Organizing (WIEGO) (O'Neill 2019). This support has put forward the environmental and economic benefits waste pickers provide including resource recovery and reductions in greenhouse gas emissions (WIEGO 2020c). Moreover, despite waste pickers providing benefits, they remain working in the informal economy, and this is worse in developing countries particularly in the African context. Kar and Marjit (2009) confirmed that the incidence of poverty among informal workers in India, e.g. youth waste pickers, is high because they face challenges such as being exposed to poor working conditions, absence of social security and health benefit schemes and poor medical facilities. Youths entering the labour market are particularly disadvantaged (Barsoum 2016). Youth performance in the labour market indicates that they tend to fare worse than adults in most outcomes (Cruces et al 2012). For example, in developed countries, youths earn lower wages and face higher unemployment and, in developing countries, they have less access to formal jobs. They also have lower wages and are commonly exempt from labour regulations and workplace benefits when compared to the formal sector (Cruces et al 2012).

In Africa, the informal economy is well established (Potts 2008) and represents the dominant sector in comparison with other sectors (Sparks and Barnett 2010). This is supported by a report from the International Labour Office (2018) that estimates 85.8% of employment in Africa is in the informal economy. In Ethiopia for example the informal economy only provides about 37% of the employment (Abebaw 2019). In Egypt the informal economy continues to grow at a faster rate and attained 51.2% of total non-agriculture activities in 2009 and today this sector has become the dominant norm in Egypt since it is considered as a primary source of revenue for the poor, unemployed and underemployed community (Ali and Najman 2017). Nigeria has the highest population among informal economies in Africa with about 57.9% contributing to the GDP in the country (Udoh 2015).

In Africa it is estimated about 4.3% of the working age population is unemployed (International Labour Organization 2019c). However, even though unemployment is low, most jobs do not provide a decent standard of living (International Labour Organization 2019b, 2019c), forcing many people to be involved into informal sector even though working conditions are poor, and there is lack of security, low remuneration and lack of social protection (Majeed et al 2017).

A study conducted by Galdino et al (2018) revealed that in the African context the informal economy is viewed as a genuine way to make a living and establish a business particularly in these countries with lack of governmental and institutional support. As a result, a lack of business orientation, excess bureaucracy and corruption, and weak legislation are all factors that constrain the establishment of formal businesses, which drive people to be involved in informality (Abreu 2007). For example in Mozambique the government does not provide support to the informal economy in terms of regulation (Chivangue 2014). Another example is in Nigeria, where there is no policy, or programmatic support by the government, and informal workers are victims of hostile urban governance policies such as the previous prohibition of cart pushers and their activities in Lagos (Nzeadibe et al 2012).

As shown in this section, the informal economy remains a large part and the main source of employment in the African context. As a result, the informal economy is the backbone of income generation. Indeed, the informal economy has accounted for much of the job creation over the last decade.

Today, possible strategies towards formalising the informal economy have been debated across multiple disciplines such as social, economic, environmental and anthropogenic. In this context, formalising the informal economy should be seen as an inclusive process, not only linked to legal economic activities but also serving as a means to define the social contract and to support nation-building. A study carried out by Rateau and Tovar (2019) stated that formalisation is accompanied by the institutional recognition of an activity and a group of people who have remained marginalized for a long time, such as waste pickers. Naidoo (2022) added that transition from the informal to the formal economy should apply a theory of change as this transition needs to be shaped based on the waste pickers needs, harnessing resources from the formal economy and structuring legal frameworks that prioritise health and social protection. Further, formalisation cannot be a means for bureaucratisation of the informal economy because it requires a clear commitment and engagement of all stakeholders in the informal and formal economy (Naidoo 2022).

The formalisation alone is not sufficient to integrate waste pickers into the reverse flow of hazardous waste e.g. electronic and electrical waste. However, there are various models with successful indicators in existence in several developing countries such as Argentina, Brazil, Colombia and India, where recycling is formalised as part of the municipal public service and waste pickers have the opportunity to be properly recognized as workers (WIEGO 2013). In Colombia, the constitutional court, in judgment N° 275 of 2011 states that waste pickers historically play a highly important role as environmental stakeholders, while in Peru, Law N° 27 419 specifies that the state recognizes the activity of waste pickers and promotes their formalisation as well as their integration into MSWM system (Rateau and Tovar 2019).

The formalisation of informal economies can take different approaches, such as registration, taxation, organization and representation, legal frameworks, social protection, business incentives or support, and more. While formalisation can also different meanings for different informal workforces, for the waste picker community formalisation would include the following benefits as outlined in table 6.

A summary of countries where formalisation of waste pickers has been reported is presented in table 7.

Common approaches for waste pickers' formalisation need to be based on the achievement of collective goals for common economic development where authorities provide support through regulations, equipment supply, infrastructure and among others. Formalisation is not just about regulation, it is about treating informal workers such as waste pickers as human beings and allowing them their basic human rights (WIEGO 2021b).

Aparcana (2017) found that there are common approaches for waste pickers formalisation such as waste pickers organized in associations or cooperatives, organized waste pickers in community-based organizations or micro-small enterprises as well as contracted as individual workers by the formal MSW sector. Waste pickers formalisation into the formal MSW process requires cooperatives or other types of organizations (Ghisolfi et al 2017). Once waste pickers are formalised, they will have a much higher likelihood of demanding rights, increasing collection amounts and charging higher prices. Campos (2014) alluded that in Brazil, associations and cooperatives of waste pickers have gained considerable visibility and the public policies for their formalisation have been designed at many levels of government through national, sub-national and the local level. For example in 2002, a formalisation of waste pickers was introduced into the Brazilian Code of Occupations into the Ministry of Labour (Campos 2014). Another example is in India where the national policies are recognising the informal sector which includes waste pickers. In Pune waste pickers have been authorized to provide doorstep MSW collection by the municipal government, which has also endorsed identity cards for waste pickers and covered them under an insurance program helping them to create an identity as workers as well as service providers increasing their self-esteem (Dias 2012). The Chinese government's recognition of their work has even led to efforts to formalise the sector (Da Silva et al 2019).

Indeed, waste pickers have left their mark by making themselves more visible as essential workers in many countries, particularly those countries where MSW remains poorly managed. Waste pickers in Brazil and India are well organized into cooperatives and associations recognized by the authorities and the public (Dias 2012, Campos 2014). This differs from one country to another country. For example, in Angolan, waste pickers are not organized and remain unrecognized and often work individually (Expansao 2020). Similarly in Kano state in Nigeria, where waste pickers are not organized in any formal way, yet their contribution to economic growth is significant (Muktar 2010). Morocco is the only country in Africa and the Middle East region with a national policy that recognizes the informal sector as part of the private sector and authorizes it to collect recyclables (Aparcana 2017).

Waste-picking formalisation can help waste pickers have access to dumpsites rather than be impeded (Dias 2018). This approach requires to be well systematic, which means adopting measures such as upgrading dumpsites by designating safe places for MSW separation, organizing their work schedules, which will improve the economy, address their health and occupational health and empower them (Dias 2018). A study carried out by Moreno-Sánchez and Maldonado (2006) proposed another approach to the formalisation of waste pickers in a dynamic model of production, consumption and recovery. The study shows that an optimal resource efficiency can be reached using a set of specific and complementary policies including a tax on virgin material inputs, a tax on consumption and disposal as well as a subsidy for material recovery (Moreno-Sánchez and Maldonado 2006).

Formalisation is a step to empower and give waste pickers the opportunity to be recognised as service provides where the informal sector is formalised as part of the public service. For example, in Tunisia waste pickers would prefer to have licences that would allow them to sell directly to the national producer responsibility system Eco-Lef even though getting a business licence is difficult and requires evidence of paying taxes. Formalisation would help them gain access to loans for securing equipment for their needs in order to raise their revenues and begin to pay taxes (Scheinberg and Savain 2015). Singh (2021) suggested that another step is the need to identify actors involved in the MSW recycling business. Since it is crucial for waste pickers to be identified in their operational area, and create their socio-economic profiles, containing the name, age, gender, and the quantity of MSW collected by every single one of them (Singh 2021).

Formalisation is seen as a key to improving waste pickers livelihood and has advantages such as access to social protection, access to MSW, and fair payment. However, there are also some disadvantages in the formalisation process. A South African study conducted by Samson (2009a) stated that formalisation of the informal economy can also bring some disadvantages to people involved in this sector due to privatization. Privatization can result in reducing the role of waste pickers in recycling activities, but also decreasing the overall levels of recycling (Sandhu et al 2017). According to Da Silva et al (2019) formalisation of the informal economy through waste picking activities can bring disadvantages to the poorest who depend on this sector to improve their livelihood. For example in China waste pickers preferred to stay in informal employment because of their fear of regulated pricing and of the system becoming less efficient (Da Silva et al 2019).

Another report by WIEGO (2020a) also points out that around the world waste pickers have been displaced by the privatization of MSWM and by disposal systems such as incinerators and waste-to-energy technologies. Privatisation policies take significantly different forms in different places because of specific social, economic and political dynamics within each city or country (Samson 2009b). For example, in India, waste pickers used to perform door-to-door collection but privatisation in some municipalities has led to private companies now performing this task, which resulted in negative impacts for waste pickers who were displaced and lost free access to the source that generated their livelihood (Samson 2009b). Conflicts can occur when waste pickers are left out of the new formal MSWM system (O'Neill 2019). The informal economy as described by Fall (1989) is an important source of production of goods and services that contribute to people development and the economy as a whole.

Pholoto (2016) warned that formalisation of an informal economy through waste picking activities can bring problems to the poorest when municipalities or states move from supporting independent informal waste-picking to subcontracting municipal services to competitive cooperatives. Bermudez et al (2019) agrees that formalisation can bring disadvantages to waste pickers by complicating relationships and alliances with processing companies with waste pickers no longer being able to work independently. For example, in Bogotá in Colombia, waste pickers who belong to cooperatives believe that the benefits are not sufficient, or there are no benefits considering the time they attend meetings and other obligations of the cooperative which force them to withdraw. Waste pickers have a predisposition to mistrust regulations due to the independence that their work offers them and considering that the association could be limiting (Bermudez et al 2019).

Many in the informal economy fear that their jobs could be lost under formalisation and, as a result, waste pickers struggle to improve their livelihood because of their family duties and lack of social protection (Kasinja and Tilley 2018). A study carried out by Dias (2016) agrees formalisation brings challenges for waste pickers such as the need to create a new identity as workers in order to become accountable to residents and to the municipality. In Cameroon, for example, traders must interact with multiple government departments which are often poorly administered and as a result informal workers also fear that formalisation will result in them having their meagre earnings taxed.

Ghisolfi et al (2017) argues that lack of waste picker formalisation occurs due to the absence of legal incentives. For example, in Nigeria waste pickers have not been formalised into environmental agencies since their activities remain controversial and illegal due to the unhygienic method of MSW separation (Oguntoyinbo 2012). Similar problems occur in Russia where there is a significant blind-spot about this issue (Potinkara et al 2018), as well as in India, where the cultural, ethnic as well as caste-based divide of the society undermines recent policies aimed to improve waste pickers conditions (Da Silva et al 2019).

Another disadvantage according to WIEGO (2021b) highlighted that governments continue stigmatizing waste pickers work by offering to retrain waste pickers who want to continue to be waste pickers. In addition, where waste pickers were awarded the legal right to collect MSW by the court, they often do not want to be employed by municipalities but continue to be self-employed as entrepreneurs (WIEGO 2021b).

Formalisation means shifting informal workers such as waste pickers from poor conditions to better livelihoods. Moreover, formalisation can bring a range of advantages for waste pickers including legal recognition, freedom from harassment, better access to MSW, the right to bid for MSW management contracts as paid service providers for collecting, recycling, and transporting MSW, and access to space and equipment for collecting, transporting, sorting and storing recyclable materials, including safety equipment and clothing (Chen 2018, WIEGO 2020b). Furthermore, other benefits of formalisation such as access to loans, have not been well communicated to informal workers (McKay et al 2015).

Medina (2008) mentions that one of the main benefits of formalisation is the possibility of entering into agreements or contracts for recycling programs with MSW separation at the source. Recovered materials that have been separated at source increase the productivity and income of waste pickers by reducing their time to search for valuable materials. This removes waste pickers from dumpsites which reduces the health risks from contact with hazardous waste (Medina 2008). Medina (2008) argues that formalisation is not only the key tool to improve waste pickers lives but is also inclusive for the waste picking community.