Pepenadores: Scavengers
Huiwon Jang
Global Perspectives
May 19th, 2022
Background Information
The United Nations (UN) Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) were established in
2015 by the UN General Assembly. The SDGs are seventeen goals to be achieved by the year
2030. The goals present the tasks that humanity must accomplish in order to reach “peace and
prosperity” (United Nations). The third among the seventeen goals is Good Health and
Well-Being, which promotes the welfare of all global citizens. With the arrival of a global
pandemic, this SDG has faced many challenges and step-backs. Some parts of the world where
this goal has faced difficulties include the Republic of Sierra Leone, which is said to have only
twenty-two physicians for every million people. In addition to this, countries like Myanmar have
extremely low life expectancies that do not yet reach the age of the Organization for Economic
Co-operation and Development (OECD) average, 76.4 years.
In addition to the above cases this SDG has not yet been met in Mexico. One of the
causes is due to the mistreatment and ignorance that the Mexican government has shown to the
trash scavengers. Trash scavengers, called pepenadores, are an integral part of Mexican Society.
They scavenge the landfills of Mexico in order to sell recyclable materials to “middlemen” to
receive meager pay. Some pick trash up from the streets in order to receive tips from facilities. It
is estimated that 50,000 to 4,000,000 people live as scavengers in Latin America (Boston
University), which translates to seven billion US dollars in cumulative economic impact (World
Bank). Due to the nature of their work, which is closely tied with waste material, they face many
detrimental health defects. Yet, compared to the impact that they have on Mexican—and further,
Latin American—society, their health and well-being is not taken into consideration at all by the
government. This is due to the fact that trash scavengers are considered to be the “poorest of the
poor” (United Nations University…), and are an informal workforce that is easily ignored.
Past Action
The UN recognizes trash scavengers from around the world to be an important part of
waste management in many countries. United Nations University's Our World, a magazine, has
published articles regarding this topic multiple times. It also recognizes that Mexico’s landfills,
as well as recycling centers, have been subject to unfathomable amounts of garbage. However,
instead of also acknowledging the roles of the pepenadores and building a bridge between them
and the government, the United Nations has not taken any action to alleviate this crisis thus far.
There have been a few non-governmental organizations (NGO) that have stepped up to
deal with this problem. The most notable of them is Women in Informal Employment:
Globalizing and Organizing (WIEGO). WIEGO has, with the arrival of the recent pandemic,
advocated for the welfare of trash scavengers. WIEGO created an assessment of human rights for
waste pickers, and also held a photo exhibition at Museo de Tolerancia y Memoria to increase
awareness on the poor working conditions of the waste scavengers. Furthermore, they created the
Los Rifados de la Basura campaign, which advocates for public awareness and support for waste
pickers. Martin Medina, a senior international relations specialist, is also a prominent figure in
this issue. He is the author of The World’s Scavengers: Salvaging for Sustainable Consumption
and Production, a book on the trash scavengers of the world. He started the chain of articles
related to the trash scavengers of Mexico and the U.S. He traveled to various landfills of the
world in order to accumulate data, and convinced the World Bank, as well as the Inter-American
Development Bank, to aid the pepenadores. His research has been crucial to spreading awareness
about the trash scavengers.
Surprisingly, the works that especially stood out were not by NGOs, but by a
trash-reclaiming company named Avangard Innovative. The company gathers 74,000 tons of
Polyethylene terephthalate (PET) plastic a year, and half of that amount can be attributed to the
work of trash scavengers (United Nations University...). Middlemen are reported to take up to 90
percent of the pepenadores’ profit from selling recyclables (Oscar Fergutz 2011). Unlike the
pre-existing system that exploits trash scavengers, the company decided to exclude the
middlemen and trade directly with the pepenadores. In addition to this, the company, in
cooperation with the NGO Fundacion Mundo Sustenable, made changes to increase the quality
of living for the trash scavengers. They built materials recovery facilities (MSF), which
systemified the trash categorizing process. The pepenadores were equipped with protective gear
as well, reducing the risk of adverse effects that toxic waste material could have on the workers.
They also created Children’s Development Centres, in order to care for the children of the
pepenadores and eradicate child labour from the picture. The centers provide the trash pickers’
children with education, opening up opportunities for them to have a better future. These steps
that they had taken were all a part of their attempt to abide by the International Finance
Corporation (IFC)’s safeguards in order to receive a 24.5-million-dollar loan for the expansion of
Petstar, a polyethylene terephthalate (PET) recycling plant. As a result, the use of child labor in
Petstar has halved in recent years.
Country Accountability
Mexico has, over the years, more or less contributed to the crisis. Nowadays,
governments around the world–including Mexico–are attempting to impose the Integrated Solid
Waste Management (ISWM) method, which does not include the hand-picking labor of
pepenadores. In Mexico, due to the Ley de Residuos Sólidos del Distrito Federal, or the Solid
Waste Law of the Federal District, waste pickers’ work is illegal. However, in Mexico, laws and
regulations are not enough to control the waste management sector (The Governance of
Waste…). Thus, local authorities become torn between the two methods, and this resulted in a
hybrid approach. The informal conditions that the waste pickers are forced to work in has opened
the door for the exploitation of the pepenadores’ labor. One scavenger in Morelos, Mexico has
testified that “they do not help us, instead they require us to clean up municipal green areas”,
(The Governance of Waste…). To the local authorities, using the existing system of scavengers is
much easier and cost-effective than following the formal method. Most of the trash pickers,
however, are not respected or appreciated at all, nor are they provided with appropriate subsidies
that a government-affiliated organization usually has. The Mexican government has ignored this
issue for a long time, but the rise of NGOs as well as human rights movements has propelled it to
make a change. The Mexico City Commission of Human Rights (CDHDF) had established a
recommendation on waste management services to alleviate the working conditions of the
pepenadores. This recommendation introduced some rules that the municipalities must follow
when utilizing the trash pickers’ labor. It included possible forms of social security and
healthcare, in addition to a special state protection. A notable component of this recommendation
was that the CDHDF admitted to the problems that the informal setting of the scavengers’ work
was creating (WIEGO). This recommendation was issued in August, 2016. Six years have passed
since then, but nothing much seems to have changed. Looking at an article published by the
Mexico Daily Post in March of 2021, the waste pickers of Mexico City still do not receive a
formal wage. They still do not have a formal contract, nor any recognition. Francisco
Bustamante, a “volunteer”—another word for pepenadores—says that “it’s not that the
Government or any other entity supports me financially for the sweep. According to me, all
street sweepers should be basic, receive a salary, and now yes: I demand that you sweep
everything and leave it clean,” (Mexico Daily Post). In the WIEGO article, they made the point
that the recommendation did not, in fact, have binding effect, and was possibly a form of
strategic litigation. Their prediction was proven to be correct.
Personal Advocacy
In order to advocate for change in this issue, I can email the WIEGO organization in
order to let them know that I am interested in taking action and ask them if there could be any
volunteering opportunities for me. I can also send emails to the Mexican waste management
officials to let them know that they have not adhered to the recommendations proposed by their
own human rights commission.
I can raise awareness to this crisis by creating a club at school dedicated to supporting the
informal trash pickers. Creating the club would mean that I have to publicize and also host
fundraisers, which would be effective in letting the school know about this issue. In addition to
this, I can repost articles related to the pepenadores on social media platforms.