Wasting the Nation.indd - Groundwork

Chapter 3: The politics of wasteWhile all respondents to the Bill expressed support for the waste hierarchy, businesswas quick to emphasise the ‘overlapping jurisdiction’ with DTI in relation toproduction. It also played up potential ‘technical barriers to trade’ under World TradeOrganisation (WTO) rules, specifically noting “regulations to give effect to any productrequirements”. 54 Finally, business demanded a more rigorous ‘regulatory impactassessment’. Such assessments are pushed by the World Bank and share a commonpurpose with the Bank’s annual Doing Business reports. They are designed to restrictthe regulation of markets. As French legal scholar Alain Supiot comments, these areinstruments of a global economic system in which “it is no longer products that are incompetition but the normative [regulatory] systems” [2006: 119]. Government is inthe process of developing a regulatory impact assessment system which will be used toreinforce arguments for making the country more attractive to investment capital.IncinerationPrior to the parliamentary hearings, it became clear that the DEAT had decided infavour of incineration. Following groundWork’s meetings with communities next tocement kilns, the DEAT initiated its own series of workshops within the ‘National policydevelopment process for high temperature waste incineration and AFR [‘alternativefuels’] co-processing in cement production’. groundWork’s Musa Chamane observesthat, far from consultation, government was “essentially … marketing incineration”to communities. 55Background reports for the policy process were prepared by advocates of incinerationand the use of AFRs in cement kilns. They were subject to detailed criticism in aresponse from groundWork [Watson 2007]. These documents were put to theportfolio committee which subsequently held a discussion specifically on incineration.The DEAT argued that regulation should focus on emissions rather than technologiesand that modern incinerators have low emissions and provide a better alternative tolandfills, particularly for medical and certain hazardous wastes.For the incineration advocates themselves, the claim of superior environmentalperformance depends both on ‘best available techniques’ (BAT) and ‘best environmentalpractice’ (BEP). Amongst other things, BAT incinerators are designed to burn particular54 Business Unity South Africa, Submission to parliament on the Waste Management Bill.55 Musa Chamane, Incineration in our backyard a big No No! groundWork Newsletter, Vol.10, No.2. June 2008.- 74 - groundWork - Wasting the Nation