Detecting Lead in Toys

  • Bill Radosevich tests the sword on the lego creature Phyllis Gallzo's son plays with. (Photo by Lisa Ann Pinkerton)

Fisher Price recently recalled 10 million toys containing lead paint and tiny magnets. The news is making health officials and many parents wonder about other
objects children play with. In the past, testing objects for lead has been time consuming,
but new technology could make lead detection in everyday objects easier and faster. Lisa
Ann Pinkerton has more:

Transcript

Fisher Price recently recalled 10 million toys containing lead paint and tiny magnets. The news is making health officials and many parents wonder about other
objects children play with. In the past, testing objects for lead has been time consuming,
but new technology could make lead detection in everyday objects easier and faster. Lisa
Ann Pinkerton has more:


In a canvas shopping bag, Phyllis Gallzo has 3 of her son’s favorite toys. In her hand is
one made of Legos that looks like an alien robot creature. She’s afraid it could contain
lead:


“Listening to the news and concern about toys coming from China, I was very
concerned my son getting exposure to the chemicals he really didn’t need. So I brought in
the toys that he plays with mostly.”


Eighty percent of America’s toys are made in China, so Gallzo’s come to a free lead
screening event held by the Ohio Network for the Chemically Injured to find out about her
son’s toys. The action figure she holds is sporting a long silver sword. It’s pockmarked,
from being chewed on by Gallzo’s 8 year old son. If the sword was manufactured with
lead-based plastic or paint the toy could be giving her son small doses of lead and slowly
poisoning him. Lead is a neuro-toxin and has been linked to learning disabilities and lower
IQ’s.


Usually, Gallzo would have to surrender her son’s toy to be destroyed in a lab to figure
out what its made of, but today a new type of technology is being used. Bill Radosevich,
of the company Thermo Scientific is going to zap the plastic sword with an X-ray gun
his company’s designed. In the first 5 seconds, the toy’s elements pop up on a computer
screen:


“About 6000 parts per million of zinc, we’re seeing a little bit of copper, that’s probably
part of the coloring….I’m definitely not seeing lead.”


Gallzo was lucky, her son’s favorite toy is free of lead. But beside Radosevich, is a
suitcase filled with toys that didn’t pass the test. On display are low brand or no brand
items, like plastic teething rings, a simple black snorkel, children’s jewelry and marti gras
beads. All objects kids have been known to suck and chew on. Radosevich says they all
contain lead in excess of 600 parts per million, the American limit for consumer
products:


“I’m less concerned about a hair piece than I am about something that’s supposed to be put into a
child’s mouth.”


Radosevich’s testing device looks like a Faser gun from an old Star Trek show. It uses x-
ray technology and it’s not cheap, they go for 30,000 dollars a piece. Radosevich
says metal industries and archaeologists already use the device for different purposes, but
he thinks product importers and toy retailers might be interested in them too. Michael
Zigenhagan, owns the toystore Play Matters and he says testing toys for lead is not his
responsibility:


“I don’t think that’s within the scope of a retailer’s capabilities. We wouldn’t be
asking national big box retailers to create their own testing arms for the products they
carry. That’s ultimately the manufacturer’s job to do that.”


But the way toys are manufactured in China is a tangled supply chain, with various
components of a toy coming from different factories. Rachel Weintrub is with the
Consumer Federation of America. She says importers are putting too much trust in the
manufacturers they contract with. Her group is lobbying Congress to require US
companies, such as Mattel, to make sure a toy’s components aren’t contaminated before they’re assembled in China:


“If it were required that paint be tested for safety before the paint were used on the
product, this huge harm would be prevented.”


Weintrub says waiting until a product is in the supply chain and issuing a recall isn’t
completely effective. She says recalls never get all the defective products back, and
ultimately that leaves toys in the marketplace and children in potential harm.


For the Environment Report, I’m Lisa Ann Pinkerton.

Related Links

E-Waste Polluting Overseas

  • Exposed to toxic chemicals such as lead and mercury, workers stay at the scrap yards for the $130-a-month pay. (photo by Ted Land)

At your home, chances are your TV, computer and other electronic gear were made
overseas. That’s because it’s cheaper to make them there. And it’s cheaper to get rid of old
electronics overseas. Someday, your old cell phone or CD player might end up right back
where it started: in China. Ted Land visited a Chinese city where electronic waste, or e-waste, is shipped by the thousands of tons. Pollution from that waste is threatening the
health of people who live there:

Transcript

At your home, chances are your TV, computer and other electronic gear were made
overseas. That’s because it’s cheaper to make them there. And it’s cheaper to get rid of old
electronics overseas. Someday, your old cell phone or CD player might end up right back
where it started: in China. Ted Land visited a Chinese city where electronic waste , or e-
waste, is shipped by the thousands of tons. Pollution from that waste is threatening the
health of people who live there:


The city of Taizhou is in eastern China. It’s an industrial port city. A lot of the people
who travel here are here on business. Ships loaded with new products are often headed
for the United States. But it’s not just what leaves this city that makes business boom…
it’s also what’s coming in:


“I know it’s polluted here but it’s not a big deal. The most important thing is my
children, that’s the reason why I found work here.”


Liu Qinzhen works at this Taizhou scrap plant. It’s the final stop for some of the nearly
4,000 tons of scrap and e-waste that enters the port each day. Liu is one of hundreds of
workers who squat under an outdoor pavilion picking apart old circuit boards and wires.
She works 9 hours a day, 7 days a week, earning about 130 dollars a month.


The work is dangerous. She and the other workers are exposed to harmful chemicals
from e-waste such as lead and mercury. The 23-year-old moved here for this job because
she needed to support her two kids:


“I used to work in a shoe factory but then I had a baby and it’s not convenient to have a
baby there so I moved here even though the pay is the same. I come from the countryside.
You can’t earn money on a farm.”


The plant where she works is considered safer than scrapping these materials in the
countryside where families work in their front yards and in their homes. They melt
circuit boards and burn wires to extract bits of valuable copper and gold.


Environmental organizations have documented evidence that what’s left over after the
valuable metals are retrieved is dumped into local rivers and streams:


(Land:) “I noticed when we arrived they shut down the other door of that other shop?


“They are doing the same kind of e-waste, but they are afraid of being discovered by
others.”


Afraid, says Taizhou resident Chen Yijun because what they’re doing is illegal. Chinese
law forbids the import of e-waste, yet piles of foreign electronics litter the countryside
and pour into scrap plants daily.


Yijun is a teacher at Taizhou #1 High School, where students are concerned about what
the e-waste industry is doing to their environment. They’ve been testing the water in
local streams, looking for signs of harmful chemicals:


On this day they draw several gallons from a stream. The banks are littered with piles of
electrical cable. Chen Zhengyan has been working on the project for years:


“The frogs here are different from frogs in other places because sometimes they have
extra limbs. We are sure the pollution is from e-waste because in this area there is no
other industry.”


Chen and her colleagues say this pollution is harmful to people, too. They tell local
government officials such as Liang Xiaoyong that something has to be done to improve
the situation. But, Liang says there’s only so much the government can do to combat an
illegal industry that so many residents make their living off of. He says cutting off the
imports is difficult because sometimes e-waste is hidden in with other scrap. He doesn’t
deny the waste industry is a big business here:


This industry generates a lot of tax money for us in the form of tariffs. So, if this industry
doesn’t exist, the Taizhou harbor won’t survive.


Jim Puckett is coordinator of the Basel Action Network, a Seattle based group that
confronts toxic trade issues around the world. He says it’s not that the Chinese
government is unwilling to stop imports, it’s simply unable to stop them.


“They’ve banned the import, the problem is they can’t control that flow, it’s just coming at
them container load after container load through various ports and they can’t possibly check every
single one.”


American waste is literally fueling the fires burning electronics that dot the countryside in
China. And many of the original owners of this gear had taken it to be recycled, and
thought they’d done the right thing. But, often it ends up on a ship, headed for scrap
yards overseas.


About seven thousand miles away from Taizhou, practically the other side of the globe,
there’s a warehouse in Springfield, Illinois stacked with old electronic gear.


The Illinois State Department of Central Management Services, or CMS, disposes of old
state property, including old copy machines, computers, and monitors. In 2005, CMS
was contacted by the Basel Action Network with some disturbing information. The
group was finding State of Illinois computers dumped in developing countries around the
world. Curtis Howard is manager of CMS state and federal surplus property:


“It hit me pretty hard, the fact that, not realizing, you know I always look at it, these guys
were here, they come in, they bid on our property, you know I’m maximizing the return on
the state’s investment, I’m doing a good job, I never really thought about the tail end of
the dragon.”


Basel Action Network coordinator Jim Puckett says if the Chinese are unable to stop the
imports, then it’s up to the United States to control what they export:


Other countries have laws forbidding it, laws controlling it, but in the United States, we
don’t even have a law to control this export.


The U.S. is one of only a handful of countries that have not signed and ratified the Basel
Convention, an international treaty that bans hazardous waste exports. That means if
anything is going to be done to stop electronic waste from polluting countries overseas,
it’s going to be up to the States to take action.


It starts with buying electronics from companies that make products that are more easily
recycled, and ends with making sure old electronic gear is getting into the hands of
responsible recyclers who don’t simply ship the e-waste to scrap yards overseas.


For the Environment Report, I’m Ted Land.

Related Links

China’s Co2 Emissions on the Rise

China is now producing more carbon dioxide emissions than the United
States. Lester Graham reports experts expected China to become the
leader in CO2 emissions, but not so soon:

Transcript

China is now producing more carbon dioxide emissions than the United
States. Lester Graham reports experts expected China to become the
leader in CO2 emissions, but not so soon:


Just last year, experts were predicting China CO2 emissions would
exceed U.S. emissions by as soon as 2009. Turns out, China was already
there.


The Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency estimates China’s CO2
emissions for last year, 2006, were 8% higher than the United States.
CO2 is the main greenhouse gas which most scientists believe is
contributing to climate change and global warming.


Expanding Chinese industry relies more heavily on coal for fuel than
many U.S. based industries. The new estimate will likely fuel
President George Bush’s arguments that China and other developing
nations must do more to reduce emissions.


But… the 300 million people in the U.S. are still pumping out four times the CO2 emissions
per person than China with its more than 1 billion people.


For the Environment Report, this is Lester Graham.

Related Links

Insect Death Match

  • Researchers want to bring in parasitic wasps from China to kill the emerald ash borer (pictured) to slow the beetle's spread. (Photo courtesy of the USFS)

The federal government wants to import insect parasites from China into
the US. Rebecca Williams reports officials are hoping parasitic wasps
will control a pest that’s been killing millions of trees:

Transcript

The federal government wants to import insect parasites from China into
the US. Rebecca Williams reports officials are hoping parasitic wasps
will control a pest that’s been killing millions of trees:


The emerald ash borer has already killed 20 million ash trees.
Scientists think the ash borer got into North America in cargo from
China. It came over without any of the parasites that normally keep it
in check.


Researchers want to bring in some of those parasitic wasps from China
to try to kill the ash borer beetles.


Juli Gould is with the US Department of Agriculture. She’s been
studying the parasitic wasps. She says the ash borer can’t be
eradicated, but the parasites might slow the beetle’s spread:


“The population is very widespread right now and we need another tool
in the toolbox to help control it.”


Gould says they’ve been running tests to make sure the parasitic wasps
won’t kill insects other than the ash borer. She says in her lab
tests, the parasites appear to much prefer ash borers over the other
insects they tested.


For the Environment Report, I’m Rebecca Williams.

Related Links

Lessons From Insect Infested Wood

  • A team of horses drags a dead ash tree through the woods to be milled into usable lumber. Tens of millions of ash trees have been killed by a bug imported from China called the emerald ash borer. (Photo by Lester Graham)

Ash trees are dying by the millions because of an infestation of a
foreign bug. In one town, they’re using the dead wood to help build a
library. Lester Graham reports the wood beams and flooring will be a
permanent exhibit to remind visitors of the trees that were once there
and the cost of imported pests:

Transcript

Ash trees are dying by the millions because of an infestation of a
foreign bug. In one town, they’re using the dead wood to help build a
library. Lester Graham reports the wood beams and flooring will be a
permanent exhibit to remind visitors of the trees that were once there
and the cost of imported pests:


Craig Novotney is driving a team of black draft horses, some young
Percherons, through a wood lot. They’re dragging a pretty good sized
log out into the open to be trucked away and turned into lumber. They
could have used a bulldozer to do this job, but that would have damaged
a lot of the other trees in these woods:


“It’s a lot less impact on the forest floor. You don’t ruin near as
much stuff, you know, getting it out with horses. It’s a kind of
lighter approach to it.”


Sixty ash trees have been cut down on this four-acre piece of land.
They were all dead, killed by a bug called the emerald ash borer. The
wood from these dead trees will be used to make flooring, wood trim,
and to be support beams for a new branch library.


The architects knew they wanted to use ash, as a way of reminding
people of this disappearing natural resource. But it was the flooring
contractor who suggested the ash wood they needed was on the very
property where the library is to be built.


John Yarema owns Johnson Hardwood Floors:


“We were originally came out to look at flooring and ash. And when we
told them we could use the material off the site, they were excited.”


Rather than just flooring, Yarema suggested the architects use the dead
ash trees for some of the structure of the building, so that people
could see the damage the emerald ash borer had done, a sort of
permanent exhibit.


“One wall – it’s a 90 foot wall facing the woods – all glass. So, in
front of that, we’re going to have trees, emerald ash borer-killed
trees supporting that wall.”


The trees will still bear the marks of the damage done by the bug.
The ash tree is a popular tree, but like this place where they’re
chopping down the trees, city after city has had to cut down all of
their ash trees in an effort to stop the spread of the emerald ash
borer.


Despite efforts to quarantine infested areas, the emerald ash borer
is spreading. It was first detected in Michigan in 2002. It probably
came in shipping crates from China. The pest already has spread to a
half dozen other states and Ontario. The bug is being spread in part by people
hauling firewood with them on vacation and hunting trips, and in some
cases by nursery stock being shipped out of the area.


Josie Parker is the Director of the Library District in Ann Arbor,
Michigan where this new branch library is being built.


“Because it’s a public building, it will tell the story of what can
happen and did when there’s an infestation. This building will always
be here. The emerald ash borer tracings will be evident in the wood.
So, we’ll be able to explain (to) science classes and anyone who’s
interested what happened to ash trees and why we need to be more
careful about insect infestations.”


A lot of the dead ash has been cut up for firewood. But some people
have felt that the wood shouldn’t be wasted. It should be preserved
somehow. John Yarema says it makes him sad, seeing the ash tree
disappear. But, he likes the idea of using these ash trees in a way
that might serve as a lesson:


“It’s nice in the sense that it’s in an educational facility and not
chopped up into firewood. So, in that way, you feel better than
burning it in a fireplace. If we can make a statement and maybe
somebody will look at it, maybe a child will look at it and say, you
know, ‘Wow, this is…’ because (in) 40 years there aren’t going to be
any. The only ash trees that’ll be around will be in the flooring, the
walls, the ceiling and in the structure. I think we just all need to
open our eyes and hope for the best, I guess.”


For the Environment Report, this is Lester Graham.

Related Links

Seed Bank Hopes to Save Trees in Peril

  • Examples of ash tree seeds that are part of the collection effort. (Photo by Lester Graham)

People have been saving seeds for thousands of years. Gardeners save
seeds of their favorite plants. Governments save seeds to protect
their food crops. Now, some people are freezing the seeds from trees.
That’s because the trees are being destroyed by an insect pest.
Rebecca Williams reports they’re hoping a gene bank will protect the
trees’ DNA and some day help bring the trees back:

Transcript

People have been saving seeds for thousands of years. Gardeners save
seeds of their favorite plants. Governments save seeds to protect
their food crops. Now, some people are freezing the seeds from trees.
That’s because the trees are being destroyed by an insect pest.
Rebecca Williams reports they’re hoping a gene bank will protect the
trees’ DNA and some day help bring the trees back:


Seeds are a pretty amazing little package. They might be small, but
they’re tough. They can live through very dry and very cold
conditions.


(Sound of seed being shaken out of a paper bag)


These seeds are from ash trees. In some parts of the Upper Midwest and
Ontario, ash trees have been wiped out. The seeds are all that’s left.
That’s because of the emerald ash borer. It’s a tiny green beetle that
got into the US in cargo shipped from China. So far, the beetles have
killed 20 million ash trees. No one’s been able to stop the beetles
from spreading.


David Burgdorf works for a lab with the US Department of Agriculture.
He says people might not even know they had ash trees until the trees
got attacked:


“If your lawn was filled with the ash tree and you had all this great
shade and your energy bills were low, but now the ash tree’s gone, you
only miss it when it’s gone.”


Burgdorf says a lot of people love ash trees for their gold and purple
fall colors. They grow fast and hold up well under ice storms. Native
American tribes depend on black ash for making baskets and medicine.


David Burgdorf is trying to make sure ash trees won’t disappear completely
if the beetle spreads across the country. He’s gathering ash seeds
sent in by volunteers. He’s hoping to build a collection that
represents the entire ash tree gene pool:


“We want to try not to have to bring something back. We don’t want it
to be extinct. It’s important we at least save the seed so we can maybe cross
it, or do something, breed in resistance to the tree and have it
available to come back.”


Burgdorf says he thinks of the seeds as an investment for the future.
The seeds are definitely being treated like a precious commodity.
They’re sorted and they’re X-rayed to make sure the living embryos in
the seeds haven’t been damaged.


Then, the very best seeds in the bunch are off to a high security
government vault:


“We kind of joke that it’s the Fort Knox for seeds.”


Dave Ellis is the seed curator at the National Center for Genetic
Resources Preservation. It’s a giant seed bank. Ellis says the ash
seeds are dehydrated and frozen at 0 degrees Fahrenheit. These steps
put the seeds into a deep sleep:


“In a dehydrated state, degradation of DNA happens much more slowly,
over a course of tens of years or hundreds of years.”


Ellis says the ash seeds should be viable for at least 25 years, if not
longer. He says researchers might be able to use the stored genetic
material to breed new pest-resistant ash trees in the future. Ellis
sees gene banks as a safeguard against a world that’s changing fast.


Scientists say wild plants and crops we depend on will face many new
threats. Climate change might bring more drought.
Escalating global trade could mean importing more pests.


Deb McCullough studies insect pests at Michigan State University. She
says any time you import cargo, you’re running the risk of also
importing pests that can run up huge bills. She says in North America,
one of the big concerns is imports from China:


“If you look at the latitude where China occurs, if you look at the
northern and southern latitude and you overlay that on top of the US and
Canada, it matches up almost perfectly. So you can figure that pretty
much any kind of climate or habitat you find in China, there’s going to
be something similar in the US.”


McCullough says not everything that gets in will turn out to be a pest,
but she says as China’s huge trade surplus with the US grows, there’s a
greater risk more pests will come in.


She says there are some new regulations in place, but restricting
international shipping is a tricky proposition. McCullough says seed
collecting might be one way to preserve plants we rely on:


“People who are molecular biologists, the gene jockeys, have gotten
very good at enhancing or producing resistant varieties of different
kinds of plants. So, that may be something that becomes an option in the
future, maybe not the too distant future.”


McCullough points out there will be serious debate about introducing a
genetically modified tree into the wild. Some people don’t like the
idea of manipulating the genetic makeup of plants or animals.


There are a lot of questions about what might be done with the frozen
seeds, but the seed collectors say regardless, they need to bank up the
DNA of plants that we’re in danger of losing.


For the Environment Report, I’m Rebecca Williams.

Related Links

China Exporting Dangerous Metal

US environmental groups and regulators are concerned about lead in products imported from China. Lead is commonly used in Chinese manufacturing because it’s cheap and flexible. Rebecca Williams reports:

Transcript

US environmental groups and regulators are concerned about lead in products imported from China.

Lead is commonly used in Chinese manufacturing because it’s cheap and flexible. Rebecca

Williams reports:


Earlier this year, a Minneapolis boy died from lead poisoning after swallowing a toy charm sold with a

pair of Reebok shoes. The charm was found to be 99% lead.


Scott Wolfson is a spokesperson for the US Consumer Product Safety Commission. He says the

commission’s especially concerned about imported toy jewelry made with lead.


“We are an agency responsible for recalling over 160 million pieces of children’s jewelry over the past

three years. Much of it has actually come from China.”


Wolfson says the commission is pressuring Chinese government officials and manufacturers to

switch to alternate metals.


The Sierra Club is suing the US government to stop the sale of toy jewelry made with lead.


For the Environment Report, I’m Rebecca Williams.

Related Links

U.S. Motorcycles to Rev Up in China?

Many American manufacturing companies are trying to break into the Chinese market. With about a billion people, the idea of selling goods in China is an attractive one, but the GLRC’s Christina Shockley has the story of one company that’s having a hard time reaching Chinese citizens. That’s because local environment and safety regulations often stand in the way:

Transcript

Many American manufacturing companies are trying to break into the Chinese market.
With about a billion people, the idea of selling goods in China is an attractive one, but
the GLRC’s Christina Shockley has the story of one company that’s having a hard time reaching
Chinese citizens. That’s because local environment and safety regulations often stand in the way:


Motorcycle maker Harley-Davidson opened a dealership in Beijing in April. It’s the
company’s first shop in China in at least 60 years.


Robert Kennedy is Executive Director of the William Davidson Institute at the University
of Michigan. The institute studies business and policy issues in emerging markets.
Kennedy says there’s a huge demand in countries like China for products associated with
the American way of life. He says Harley-Davidson motorcycles are a prime example:


“I mean, they’re associated with a particular lifestyle here, it’s a very American thing.
And they have very low penetration in China and India, and these other countries now,
but because there’s slowed demand growth in the US, if they want to grow, that’s a great
place for them to go.”


Kennedy says it’s very common for companies to try to ease restrictions in other
countries to make it easier for them to export goods and there are several restrictions on
motorcycles in China. The rules vary from community to community, but most large
cities ban, or severely limit, motorcycle use in the city center.


Experts say the rules are in place partly because of safety and environmental issues.
Barrett McCormick specializes in Chinese politics at Marquette University. He says
environmental problems can be intensified because Chinese roads are clogged, and most
motorcycles there are dirty:


“Anyone who’s been to China 10 years ago or something, a common site is some horrible
little motorcycle putting down the road, with a big cloud of smoke behind it, and I think that’s
the kind of thing that the Chinese government has regulated to eliminate.”


McCormick says air quality is one of China’s most pressing problems. A recent report
from the World Health Organization says many of the most polluted cities in the world
are in China. It says one of the main sources of air pollution there is motor vehicles
emissions.


Zhixin Wu is with a company that’s working with government agencies to develop
Chinese transportation policies. He says emissions from dirty, small motorcycles in
china account for roughly 50 or 60 percent of emissions in urban areas:


“In China almost all the motorcycles use the two stroke internal combustion engine.”


Wu says that type of small engine is very dirty. But, Harley-Davidson says those bikes
are a far cry from the motorcycles it produces:


“The motorcycles in use in China, I guess I wouldn’t even characterize them as
motorcycles. I would call them two-wheelers.”


Tim Hoelter is the company’s Vice President for International Affairs. He says Harley
bikes easily meet environmental regulations in every market in which they’re sold. And
Hoelter says the company is working with officials in the United States and China to get
this point across:


“Not too long ago the Chinese ambassador to the United States came to Milwaukee and
met with local business people. I sat two seats away from him at dinner, and was able to
talk to him about these riding bans.”


Hoelter says the company is also meeting with American trade officials, and authorities
in the Chinese government, to get the rules changed. He says his company has already
helped ease motorcycle restrictions in other countries, such as Vietnam and India.


Robert Kennedy, from the William Davidson Institute, says Harley-Davidson will
probably be able to get the rules changed in a few years, assuming the regulations have
the inadvertent affect of keeping out Harley motorcycles. He says China has a huge trade
surplus with the United States, and that’s a sensitive political issue.


Kennedy says it’s not unusual for countries to have rules that keep foreign goods out,
even if that’s not their intent:


“The US has some of these regulations that keep out other countries products, and other
countries have regulations that keep out our products. It’s not like under the Romans or
the British where a country would send in the army and force them to buy our goods, it’s
just governments working together to sort out the details to allow trade to happen.


Kennedy says even though most Chinese wouldn’t be able to afford Harley motorcycles,
there are many who could, and as people there become more wealthy, the possibility
exists for a huge market.


For the GLRC, I’m Christina Shockley.

Related Links

The HIDDEN COSTS OF &Quot;JUNK" MAIL

  • Mixed paper (including "junk" mail) gets trucked to recycling facilities like this one for recycling. First, it's unloaded in big piles, then pulled up a conveyor belt for sorting. (Photo courtesy of the City of Ann Arbor)

If it seems like your mailbox is stuffed with more shiny credit card offers and catalogs than ever before, you’re right. The U.S. Postal Service says the volume of advertising mail outpaced first class mail for the first time last year. The GLRC’s Rebecca Williams reports… city waste managers and environmental groups are concerned that all that mail is going to add up to a lot more waste:

Transcript

If it seems like your mailbox is stuffed with more shiny credit card offers
and catalogs than ever before, you’re right. The U.S. Postal Service says
the volume of advertising mail outpaced first class mail for the first time
last year. The GLRC’s Rebecca Williams reports… city waste managers and
environmental groups are concerned that all that mail is going to add up to
a lot more waste:


(Sound of squeaky mailbox opening)


Maybe it’s just me, but it seems like no one sends me letters anymore.
Which means my mailbox is all coupons and catalogs and pizza ads. That’s
not all bad, but honestly, most of it goes right to the shredder.


(Sound of shredder)


According to the Environmental Protection Agency, that’s a pretty common
reaction. The EPA points to one study showing that 44 percent of advertising mail
is thrown away without being opened or read.


And there’s a lot coming in. Last year, marketers and non-profit groups sent
about 101 billion pieces of mail. That’s billion with a “B.”


You might call this junk mail, but people in the business have a more
affectionate name for it: direct mail.


Pat Kachura is with the Direct Marketing Association. She says direct mail
yields a very high return on investment.


“Marketers yield about a 7 dollar return on investment for every dollar
spent on catalog marketing, and about 15, almost 16 dollars return for every
dollar spent on non-catalog direct mail marketing.”


The Association’s annual report says those hefty returns are based on an
average of just 2.7 percent of people responding to the ads they get in the
mail. Last year, that meant more than 600 billion dollars in sales.


So, it’s profitable for marketers to fill up your mailbox.


But critics say there are hidden costs that marketers aren’t paying. Some
of those costs also arrive in your mailbox in the form of a bill from your
city for solid waste disposal or recycling.


(Sound of paper pouring into bunker from conveyor belt)


If your city accepts mixed paper for recycling, your junk mail comes to a
facility like this one where it’s sorted and packaged into giant bales
weighing one ton each.


Bryan Weinert is the solid waste coordinator for the city of Ann Arbor,
Michigan.


“We end up getting about $70 a ton back in the value of the junk mail that’s
recycled. But remember it’s costing the city roughly $125 a ton or so to
pick it up.”


Weinert says his city is lucky because it has double the nation’s average
recycling rate. He says communities that don’t have a recycling program
bear even higher costs to dispose of mixed paper.


In this case, the bales of paper get made into Kellogg’s cereal boxes.


Tom Watson is with the National Waste Prevention Coalition. He says it’s
good when there’s a local market for recycled junk mail, but much of it
actually gets sent overseas.


“The unwanted mail, the mixed paper, generally has a very low value, that is often
shipped to China and it comes back to us in the kind of mottled packaging found on
the products that we buy from China. So, it comes full circle but it’s not
very efficient, all the costs of the transportation and recycling.”


Watson says it’d be much more efficient to cut back on all that mail in the
first place.


The Direct Marketing Association does offer an opt-out service. The group
says their members aren’t allowed to send any new mailings to people who
sign up. The fastest way to sign up is online, but you have to pay a $5
charge.


Tom Watson with the National Waste Prevention Coalition says that charge
might put people off. He says he’d like to see a national Do Not Mail list.
One that isn’t controlled by the industry.


“It’s very common in other countries, you can’t send mail to someone unless
they say in advance, yes I want to receive that mail from you.”


You might expect that the folks at the Direct Marketing Association aren’t
fans of the Do Not Mail list idea, but they’re not the only ones.


“What is our position on that? (laughs) I wouldn’t like that to occur.”


George Hurst is the brand manager of direct mail for the Postal Service.
It’s his job to get direct mailers to send more mail. That’s because it’s
the second largest source of revenue for the Postal Service, in the tens of
billions of dollars.


Hurst says new laws aren’t needed. Instead, he says marketers just need to
know their audiences.


“The ones that don’t do it too well, and just blanket the earth with a message,
God bless ’em, we love the postage. But you gotta know that if you’re
talking to someone who is say, 100 miles away, about coming to your
dry cleaners, you’re probably missing the mark.”


But critics say consumers deserve to have more say over the mail they bring
into their homes. They say marketers make so much money from the mail they
send… that for that small chance you might be interested in a coupon book or
sale notice, you shouldn’t have to pay the cost to throw it away or recycle
it.


For the GLRC, I’m Rebecca Williams.

Related Links

Harley-Davidson Pushes for Ride in China

Motorcycle maker Harley-Davidson wants China to relax its restrictions on motorcycle use in big cities. The company says that’s the only way its new dealership will be successful in the country long-term. The GLRC’s Christina Shockley reports:

Transcript

Motorcycle maker Harley-Davidson wants China to relax its restrictions
on motorcycle use in big cities. The company says that’s the only way its
new dealership will be successful in the country long-term. The GLRC’s
Christina Shockley reports:


Sound of motorcycle)


Harley-Davidson has opened a new dealership in Beijing hoping to sell
its motorcycles in China, but China limits motorcycle use and ownership
in big cities because of safety concerns and environmental issues.


Tim Hoelter is a vice-president with Harley-Davidson. He says the
company hopes the restrictions will change, over time.


“We of course are hopeful that working with our government partners in
Washington, and working cooperatively with the Chinese ministries to
understand the basis for these bans that over time we can overcome
them.”


Hoelter says the company has been successful in changing bans in other
countries, including Japan… by working with the foreign and U.S
governments.


For the GLRC, I’m Christina Shockley.

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