Southeast Asia braces for trash dump as China enacts waste import ban A river canal in Ho Chi Minh City choked by mostly plastic waste. Photo: Sen Nguyen
China, which used to be the world s salvage king, is shutting its door to all waste imports starting the first day of the new year. The recent announcement triggered the same kind of anxiety among waste-exporting countries as in 2018, when China enacted its Operation National Sword policy, which banned the import of 24 types of solid waste, including plastic waste.
The 2018 policy switch caused the world s major waste-exporting countries - Europe, Britain, the US and Australia - to scramble for alternative destinations, including Southeast Asian nations like Thailand, Vietnam, and Indonesia, which quickly became overwhelmed by the volume of refuse they received. Soon after, these countries began to impose their own bans and restrictions on waste imports.