The New Waste Policy In Brazil Under The

Social Inclusion Perspective

Fernando Pinheiro Pedro, Pinheiro Pedro Advogados – PPA, São Paulo, SP, Brazil
Danielle Denny, PPA, São Paulo, SP, Brazil
Karina Fiorini, PPA, São Paulo, SP, Brazil
Camila Masri, PPA, São Paulo, SP, Brazil
Ian Libardi, PPA, São Paulo, SP, Brazil

Contact

The authors are members of Pinheiro Pedro Advogados, a law firm in Brazil, specialized in
environmental law, with address at Rua Jaspe 80, Aclimação, Cep: 01531-060, São Paulo, SP,
Brazil, Tel/Fax: (5511) 9226-0748, [email protected]

Executive Summary

This study investigates the potential of waste policy as a political process able to provide an
alternative to people who make their living from non official waste collection. The object of study
is a Brazilian garbage dump called Jardim Gramacho, the same place pictured by Vik Muniz, and
filmed by Lucy Walker, Karen Harley and João Jardim, in the movie “Waste land”. In Brazil, only
36,3% from what is recycled comes from official waste collection. The other 63,7% is recycled only
because non official collectors make their living from it. In 2010, a new law regulating this subject
was created in order to institutionalize all the process, creating responsibilities not only to producers
and consumers but to the whole waste chain, including the collectors. On one hand, this political
process can mean social inclusion, with hundreds of people taken out of poverty, but on the other
hand it can also mean more exclusion, depriving people from their way of life. The object of this
paper is to analyze the new legislation and policy, comparing them to what is implemented
nowadays by the non official collectors, so to establish a better uptake of the consequences of the
governmental action. The research is based on studies of Yves Winkin, Sabetai Calderoni and Paulo
Afonso Leme Machado.
Keywords: Waste collection. Non-official waste collectors. Brazilian waste policy. Brazilian
garbage dump. Waste land.

Introduction:

In Brazil, there are between 400 and 600 thousand collectors, 1100 organizations of collectors, and
only between 40 and 60 thousand collectors united in these organizations. Therefore only 10% of
the collectors are organized in a cooperative or association. On the other hand, only 36,3% from
what is recycled comes from official waste collection. The other 63,7% is only recycled because
non official collectors make their living from it.

The average income from the collector is between R$ 420,00 and R$ 520,00 ( U$ 245,61 and U$
304,09), therefore under the minimum Brazilian salary ( R$ 622,00 or U$ 363,74). Another problem
is the lack of education, the majority of the collectors did not complete high school. For these
reasons the social inclusion of the collectors has to be object of law, public policies and corporate
best practices.

Some laws are already in this pace. Public places are obliged to separate their waste and to
designate the recyclable material to collector’s cooperatives or associations (Federal Decree
5.940/2006). Collectors’ cooperatives or associations can be contracted easily by the public
administration to collect, process and commercialize recyclable or reusable materials (Federal Act
11.445/2007).

In 2010, a new law regulating the waste management was created in order to institutionalize all the
process, creating responsibilities not only to producers and consumers but to the whole waste chain,
including the collectors. (Federal Act 12.305/2010, Federal Decrees 7.404/2010 and 7.405/2010)

On one hand, this political process can mean social inclusion, with thousands of people taken out
of poverty, through their work in a collector cooperative or association, but on the other hand it can
also mean more exclusion, depriving the people who are not member of a collector cooperative or
association from their independent way of life.

The object of this paper is to analyze the new legislation and policy, comparing them to what is
implemented nowadays by the non-official collectors, so to establish a better uptake of the
consequences of the governmental action. Some important players in the subject were interviewed
in order to illustrate the study.

This study investigates the potential of waste policy as a political process able to provide an
alternative to people who make their living from non-official waste collection. Problematize the
way collectors cooperative and associations were catapulted to an outstanding level of relevance in
the system.

The object of study is a Brazilian garbage dump called Jardim Gramacho, already in the process of
closing down its activities, once they have hit 50 meters above sea level. The same place was
pictured by Vik Muniz, and filmed by Lucy Walker, Karen Harley and João Jardim, in the movie
“Waste land”. In it there are 2 (two) collective organizations: Cooperativa de Catadores de
Materiais Recicláveis de Jardim Gramacho – COOPERGRAMACHO and Associação de Catadores
do Aterro Metropolitano de Jardim Gramacho – ACAMJG.

Materials and methods

To carry out this article, bibliographic studies were made on solid waste and its management,
namely, collection, treatment and final disposal. We interviewed people with experience in the field
of municipal solid waste, and specifically with experience in the case of Jardim Gramacho, object
of the present study. In addition, research was done on the legislative innovative integration of
shared responsibility and reverse logistics of solid waste, also on cooperatives and associations and
on labor and corporate responsibility.

Results and discussion

The new laws regulating the waste management (Federal Act 12.305/2010, Federal Decrees
7.404/2010 and 7.405/2010) and the Rio de Janeiro State Act 4.191/ 2003 were a very important
step towards the institutionalization of all the process, creating responsibilities not only to producers
and consumers but to the whole waste chain, including the collectors. It mitigates the exploitation of
collectors by middlemen (“sucateiros” in Portuguese), reduces health risks once extinguishes waste
dumps until August 2014, obliges Public Administration to insert collector cooperatives or
associations in their collection and recycling services.

According to the new regulatory framework, landfills will receive only rejects (the waste that
cannot be recycled, converted into energy, or composted). Municipalities that do not cope with this
legal obligation may face a rage of penalties from August 2014 onwards. For this reason many
mayors are already dealing with the subject, assisted by IDB (Inter-American Development Bank)
or BNDES (Brazilian National Development Bank) and relying on extra revenues coming from
CDM (Clean Development Mechanisms).

The remuneration of a collector can vary. Some municipalities chose criteria of minimum
production, others economic feasibility, and others the potential buying price of the recyclable
material in the local market. Middlemen pay according only to the buying price of the recyclable
material in the local market. Because the buyers of recyclable materials are few and very
concentrated, they build the price and conditions. Therefore, the social inclusion of collectors
demands a minimum price market. Recyclable materials have to be considered commodities and a
specific stock market is urged by the necessity of institutionalizing the solid waste market.

Another important link in the chain is the producers, they have to be involved in the reverse policy,
and to chase this goal, the collectors play an important role, some industries have already found a
way of rewarding collectors that bring back their packaging. Collectors are also important to the
producers of recycling materials, once they provide the industry with the necessary recyclable input.

Although recycling is a profitable business, increasingly on the rise, the first link in the chain, the
collectors, are kept aside from legality and excluded from the profits, in order to increase the gains
of middlemen or recycling industry. Without institutionalized bonds of work, collectors are
excluded to social security, therefore have denied their access to pension, vacations, minimum
wage, guaranties envisaged to every Brazilian formal worker.

The collectors in Jardim Gramacho, and their poverty, are a consequence of this economic process
of exclusion, potentiated by oppressive structures of the Rio de Janeiro metropolis. Different from
what happened during the 70’s when the poor in metropolitan areas came from other Brazilian
areas, specially from Northeast, the collector in Jardim Gramacho are mostly locals (born in Rio de
Janeiro).

There are two main concepts of collectors: garbage collectors and collectors of recyclable materials.
The fundamental difference between them lies upon their survival source. That is, while the garbage
collector survives on whatever can be found in the garbage, in dumps and landfills, the collector of
recyclable materials selects materials that still have market value, or personal value and either sell
them or retain what seems useful.

Note that the garbage collector works under a sub-human condition, directly surviving on what is
considered useless for those who have purchasing power, differing from the collector of recyclable
materials that somehow manages to use capitalism in their favor and take recyclable waste as
merchandise, falling directly or indirectly into the reverse logistics chain.

However the difference of categories among collectors, the transition from garbage collectors to
recyclable material collectors was only introduced by the National Policy on Solid Waste, in 2010,
and is still in order. This study, therefore, does not distinguish one collector from the other.

Although big cities are economic hub, filled with culture and politics they face high rates of
violence, large numbers of unemployed, lack and scarcity of housing among many other structure
problems. Even so, large cities like Salvador, Belem, Belo Horizonte, Fortaleza, Recife, Curitiba,
Rio de Janeiro, Porto Alegre and Sao Paulo represent over 36.2% of the Brazilian population,
according to the census in 2010, this means more than a third of Brazilians live in metropolitan
areas.
In short, we can say that the garbage collectors of the Jardim Gramacho are impoverished people
especially because they are considered cheap labor and technically disqualified, because of that,
they are denied access to formal labor market, and are excluded from goods and services provided
to formal Brazilian workers. They can be analyzed as a result from the urban structure of the
metropolis that confines the poor to specific places without political relevance in the socioeconomic
scenario, therefore, unable to promote the social mobility necessary to ascend in the social group.

The State has transferred to private companies the task of social integration of scavengers, which
was supposed to be provided by government. It has used the cooperative as a way of insertion, but
the Brazilian Labor Law disfavors cooperatives, for the cooperated do not receive part of the profits
of the cooperative, are not registered and do not have the benefits of worker as established by the
CLT (Brazilian Labor Law).

The creation of a cooperative is a way to institutionalize the collectors inexpensively, but despite
having no burden at its inception, the cooperative, as opposed to an association, for example,
generates labor burden later.

With this issue, and over time, the cooperated will seek to judicialize the matter in order to gain
recognition of employment by companies, which had a legal obligation to insert collectors through
cooperatives in their management plan for solid waste, not by cooperatives.

What can be concluded by the functioning landfills, especially Gramacho and Cachimba in Rio de
Janeiro is that the cooperative is an organized manner of placing scavengers within the compounds
of a landfill. It is not a business activity, or semi-business activity, there is no waste sorting shed, or
preprocessing area for recyclables, but trucks releasing garbage on a dump or landfill and collectors
of recyclable materials separating and selling to middlemen, that then resell to companies.

Collectors are aware of the stigmatizing framework that involves the relationship of waste
collection as an exclusive source of survival and of the increasing work flexibility that difficult
them to access other types of working contracts, more institutionalized. Therefore they subvert this
oppressive situation with freedom. They do not compromise with timetables, goals or hierarchy;
collect what they understand is more profitable and eat, wear, use what they find.

For this reason, even in Jardim Gramacho were there are collective organizations:
COOPERGRAMACHO and ACAMJG collectors tend to understand that their work is an
individual task, doubting the possibility of surviving in collective practices. The implementation of
the new legal framework cannot ignore this aspect.

A complication to this context is that the landfills in Jardirm Gramacho are already in the process of
closing down their activities, once they have hit 50 meters above sea level. This fact will result in
unemployment of about 1893 collectors of recyclable materials (data from February 2012), and will
impact thousands who live in the neighborhood and whose activities are directly or indirectly
related to scavenging.

Jardim Gramacho has been operating since 1976 as a garbage dump run by Companhia
Municipal de Limpeza Urbana do Rio de Janeiro - COMLURB and until the year 1996 as a
garbage dump, and the entry of scavengers was controlled by drug dealers, that even charged
collectors a "toll" to enter the dump facilities.

In the mid nineties, with the growing concern about the environment issue, in particular the
pollution of Guanabara Bay and the destruction of mangroves around it, the COMLURB through a
public bidding process outsourced the management of Jardim Gramacho to the engineering
company called Queiroz Galvão, with the objective of imposing technical solutions to issues such
as restoration of mangrove area, the treatment of leachate and biogas coming from waste and to
promote the transformation of the dump into a landfill.

Queiroz Galvão also assumed responsibility for organizing the activities of scavenging for
recyclables in the landfill, as well as to perform the control and accreditation of the collectors who
were working at the site. The cooperative workers members of COOPERGRAMACHO have a
closer relationship with the company administrating the landfill, which bears some costs of the
cooperative, providing necessary equipment to perform the sorting of recyclable materials in
mechanical conveyors, personal protective equipment, equipment repair, payment of the manager,
construction of facilities such as locker rooms, accommodation and headquarters for the
cooperative.

The same benefits do not occur to the non cooperative collectors, with whom the company
administrating the landfill is only responsible for registration and for the control of collectors’ entry
and exit from the landfill. Still, the vast majority of collectors chose to remain in front of service
under the argument that would not want to lose freedom. As a reason to stay in current working
condition, the non-cooperative collector state that the option is due to the higher income and greater
flexibility. Working directly in front of service, they can work continuously for days, including
taking day and night shifts, until they achieve the yield desired, which would not be possible by the
better standards of the cooperative.

One of the biggest concerns, nowadays, is taking the scavengers off the landfills. In a smaller
landfill, that is for cities of up to 100 thousand people, especially in France where there is a
mechanical sorting for waste in the composting treatment, the scavengers have been placed in a
second step, which consists on manual separation of recyclables. In this example, collectors were
therefore removed from the direct contact with the waste from the landfills.

Since 2004, environmental agencies such as Federação Estadual de Engenharia do Meio Ambiente -
FEEMA and the nacional and state procecutors Ministério Público (Federal e Estadual) are trying to
close Jardim Gramacho because it reached its maximum capacity have hit 50 meters above sea level
and contaminates the Guanabara Bay and the mangroves around it. The forecast is the closure in
April 2012 but most of the waste is no longer brought to Jardim Gramacho.

The closure of the landfill arouses two reactions, some collectors do not believe it will happen and
others prepare themselves for the change. ACAMJG’s main objectives are in this direction, to
ensure the collectors a dignifying work after the end of the activities of the landfill, creating social
inclusion projects in the community and fighting for the implementation of selective collection in
the municipality of Duque de Caxias.

Conclusion

Cooperatives and associations of collectors need to be strengthened to achieve higher levels of

representation and efficiency. Nevertheless, the regularization of the work force in them has to aim
forms of institutionalizing the bonds of work, including the collectors in the social security,
therefore with access to pension, vacations, minimum wage, all guaranties envisaged to Brazilian
formalized workers.

The creation of mechanisms for identification and certification of cooperatives and associations of
collectors is of the utmost importance so to empower the Public Administration to identify false
recycling cooperatives and associations, hence denying them access to benefits and public
resources. Only in this context, social pro-collectors programs will be effective.
A concrete form of integrating the collector in the reverse logistics has to be perceived, as well as
guarantying to them minimum prices, incentives and access to the urban solid waste selectively
collected by the Public Administration. The end of dumps in Brazil, established by law to 2014, has
to mean an upgrade in the lives of the collectors, avoiding more social exclusion.

References

ALVAREZ, Albino Rodrigues e MOTA, José Aroudo (Coord). Plano Nacional de Resíduos Sólidos
(versão Preliminar), Ministério do Meio Ambiente, 2011. Disponível
em<http://www.cnrh.gov.br/pnrsnac/documentos/audiencia/versao_Preliminar_PNRS_WM.pdf>.
Acesso em 23/2/2012
ANTUNES, Paulo de Bessa. Direito Ambiental. 7ª ed. Rio de Janeiro: Lúmen Júris.2004.
BARBIERI, José Carlos. Desenvolvimento e meio ambiente: as estratégias de mudanças da Agenda
21. 5. ed. Petrópolis: Vozes, 1997.
BASTOS, Valéria. Catadores dentro e fora do território de Jardim Gramacho. Pontifícia
Universidade Católica do Rio de Janeiro, 2007. Disponível em < http://www.nima.puc-
rio.br/sobre_nima/projetos/caxias/apostilas/Apostila_Valeria.pdf >. Acesso em 23/2/2012
BIDONE, Francisco Ricardo Andrade e POVINELLI, Jurandyr. Conceitos Básicos de Resíduos
Sólidos. Ed. EESC/USP, 1999.
BRASIL, Anna Maria; SANTOS, Fátima. O ser humano e o meio ambiente de A a Z: dicionário. 3ª
ed. São Paulo: FAARTE Editora, 2007.
CALDERONI, Sabetai. Os bilhões perdidos no lixo. São Paulo, Humanitas Editora FFLCH/USP,
1998
DAMÁSIO, J. coord (2010a) – Impactos sócio-econômicos e ambientais do trabalho dos catadores
na cadeia da reciclagem, Produto 17, GRI/UFBA, Centro de Referência de Catadores de Materiais
Recicláveis, PANGEA, UNESCO
DENNY, Ercílio Pós Modernidade: Desafios Educacionais in Experiência e Liberdade. Editora
Opinião. Capivari. 2003
DERANl, Cristiane. Direito Ambiental Econômico, São Paulo, Max Limonad, 1997.
DIAS, Edna Cardozo. Manual de Direito Ambiental. 2ª ed. Belo Horizonte: Mandamentos, 2003.
DONAIRE, Denis. A internacionalização da gestão ambiental na empresa. Revista de
Administração. São Paulo: v. 31, n.1, p. 44-51, jan/mar. 1996.
DONAIRE, Denis. Gestão ambiental na empresa. São Paulo: Atlas, 1995.
FIORILLO, Celso Antonio Pacheco. Curso de Direito Ambiental Brasileiro. 6ª ed. São Paulo:
Saraiva, 2005.
GERBER, Wagner. Impacto ambiental: resíduos sólidos e reciclagem. Pelotas: UCPEL, 1999.
GOMES, Luiz Cláudio Moreira. A cooperativa de catadores de materiais recicláveis de Jardim
Gramacho - COOPERGRAMACHO: uma nova identidade social a partir do trabalho cooperativo.
Trabalho publicado nos Anais do XVII Congresso Nacional do CONPEDI, realizado em Brasília –
DF, nos dias 20, 21 e 22 de novembro de 2008. Disponível em <
http://www.conpedi.org.br/manaus/arquivos/anais/brasilia/09_504.pdf >. Acesso em 23/2/2012
GRIMBERG, Elizabeth e BLAUTH, Patrícia – Coleta Seletiva: reciclando materiais, reciclando
valores. Pólis, nº 31. São Paulo, 1998: Instituto Pólis.
KINLAW, Denis C. Empresa competitiva & ecológica: desempenho sustentado na era ambiental.
São Paulo: Makron Books, 1997.
LACERDA, Leonardo - Logística Reversa - Uma visão sobre os conceitos básicos e as práticas
operacionais, jan. 2002. Disponível em:
<http://www.ilos.com.br/site/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=763&Itemid=74>.
Acesso em 23/2/2012
MACHADO, Paulo Affonso Leme. Direito Ambiental Brasileiro. 15ª ed. revista, atualizada e
ampliada. São Paulo: Malheiros Editores, 2007.
MILARÉ, Édis. Direito do Ambiente : Doutrina, Jurisprudência e Glossário. 4ª ed. São Paulo:
Revista dos Tribunais, 2005.
MILARÉ, Édis. Princípios fundamentais do direito do ambiente. Justitia, São Paulo, v. 59, n.
181/184, p. 134-151, jan./dez. 1998. Disponível em:
<http://bdjur.stj.gov.br/dspace/handle/2011/23663>. . Acesso em 23/2/2012
MORENO, Renata Franco de Paula Gonçalves. Artigo: Lei de Resíduos sólidos e as novas
obrigações - Fabricantes, importadores, distribuidores e comerciantes terão que se adequar para
cumprir as exigências da Política Nacional de Resíduos Sólidos. Site: OLIVEIRA, Rosana. A
responsabilidade é de quem produz. Banas Ambiental, São Paulo, ano II, n. 9, p. 10-18, dez. 2000.
REHBINDER, Eckard. Ambiente. Economia. Diritto, Rimini, Maggioli Editore, 1988.
SILVA, José Afonso da. Direito Ambiental Constitucional. 4ª ed. revista e atualizada. São Paulo :
Malheiros Editores, 2002.
TREVIZAN, Victor Penitente – “A nova regulamentação para resíduos sólidos”. Observatório ECO
– Direito Ambiental. 26 de agosto de 2010. Disponível em :
<http://www.observatorioeco.com.br/index.php/a-nova-regulamentacao-para-residuos-solidos>. .
Acesso em 23/2/2012.
TRINDADE, Antônio A. Cançado - Direitos humanos e meio ambiente: paralelos dos sistemas de
proteção internacional, Porto Alegre, Fabris Editor, 1993.
WINKIN, Yves. A nova comunicação: da teoria ao trabalho de campo. Campinas-SP: Papirus,
1998.
WINTER, Gerd. European Environmental Law – A Comparative Perspective, Aldershot,
Dartmouth Publishing Co., 1996.