ANAS to discuss e-waste disposal

/AzerNews/

By Nigar Orujova

Institute of Information Technology of Azerbaijan's National Academy of Sciences is working on proposals on the disposal of electronic waste, ANAS reported on October 8.

The issue will be discussed at the Academy. The initiative may be offered to the government later.

"The issue of consumer electronic waste will be raised at a conference on e-government, which will be held in early December," the institute said.

The Academy plans to develop a conceptual framework to address the challenges of high-tech waste disposal. The main issue is formation of the concept of management of e-waste and making the appropriate changes in legislation.

The responsibility of society is the main problem issue in addressing the issue of recycling, the institute said, so that everyone has an idea ??what threat the e-waste creates to human health.

Electronic waste contains materials that are harmful not only for health, but also for the environment. High-tech waste list includes semiconductors, resistors, fuses, power supplies, connecting cables, conventional batteries. They contain cadmium, mercury, chromium, bromine, nickel, lithium and other chemical elements, which emit hazardous carcinogens when decompose.

The problem of e-waste is global. The UN has included it in its most important problems.

The previously published report of the UN said the number of e-waste in the world will increase by 33 percent by 2017. Weight of annually emitted electronic products will increase to 65.4 million tons in 2017. The greatest growth will be in developing countries.

As one of the developing countries, Azerbaijan is now developing and renovating its ICT sphere.

Azerbaijan is currently leading among the Commonwealth of Independent States in terms of internet penetration among individual users, and in terms of broadband internet penetration among individual users.

Last year, the country imported ICT equipment worth about $260 million, which is by 18.22 percent less compared to 2012.

The number of internet users in Azerbaijan is increasing annually. Now the country stands at 63rd place in the world in terms of the number of Internet user, according to the International Telecommunication Union report.

Azerbaijan is also implementing the broadband internet project (Fiber-to-the-Home) that will provide high-speed internet access, which is expected to cover all areas of Azerbaijan by 2017.

The ultimate goal of the project, which will cover a period of up to 2018, is to supply the entire country, including its distant rural areas, with high-speed internet with the range of 10-100 Mbit/s, and raise the number of high-speed internet users to 85 percent, which will allow Azerbaijan to reach the level of the developed countries by 2017.