and environmental pollution such as acid rain, air pollution, and water pollution increased noticeably. There was also an increase in the number of problem cases, such as the United States' Love Canal incident, in which residents were negatively impacted by hazardous chemical substances that had been dumped in the past, and Italy's Karin B incident, in which waste was exported inappropriately to developing countries and disposed of illegally.

Due to concerns about this kind of situation, the EU has issued various directives on waste since the 1970s, including the Waste Framework Directive (1975), the Hazardous Waste Directive (1991), and the Landfill Directive (1999), and EU countries have adopted these directives. The United States also enacted laws, such as the Clean Water Act (1972), the Toxic Substances Control Act (1976), and the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (1976).

Due to globalization of the economy, the global transfer of goods and services has increased. The transfer of waste that is a recyclable resource has also increased across national boundaries. In the 1980s there were many incidents of developed countries inappropriately exporting hazardous waste to developing countries that had lax environmental regulations. Environmental pollution caused by inappropriate treatment of waste in the countries to which it was exported posed a serious problem. As a result, the “Basel Convention on the Control of Trans-boundary Movements of Hazardous Wastes and Their Disposal” (Basel Convention), which aimed to prevent environmental pollution and health damage caused by export/import and treatment of hazardous waste, was adopted in 1989 and put into effect in 1992. Efforts for recycling also made progress. In addition to the widespread practices of separating waste for collection and a recycle-deposit system, recycling technologies have also become more advanced. The recycling of waste containers, waste electrical and electronic equipment, retired vehicles, waste batteries, and waste rechargeable batteries has made progress in European countries such as the Netherlands, Sweden, Denmark, Germany, and France. A concept known as Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR), in which producers are responsible for not only the production and use stages but also for the waste and recycling stages, has been advocated. Recycling laws are being formulated in Japan and other countries.

The initiatives undertaken by developed countries for waste and recycling will become even more important from now on. It will be necessary for developing countries to use these initiatives as a reference.

### 3. Expanding Japan’s Waste and Recycling Industries into the World

In the section above, we gave an overview of the waste situation in various countries. Sharing Japan's experiences with developing countries in Asia and other regions, in particular, will help them achieve development without falling victim to serious waste problems. This will be extremely important for environmental conservation throughout the world. However, since economic development is of the highest priority for developing countries, in many cases it will be difficult to put a priority on establishing a sound material-cycle society.

On the other hand, countries that are having problems with waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE), such as China, are introducing bills with content similar to that of the EU’s WEEE Directive and RoHS Directive. They are also considering the adoption of recycling technologies developed in Japan’s eco-towns. Therefore, it is necessary to introduce technologies and systems that match the development phase of each country.

Similar to other environmental technologies, waste and recycling technologies cannot be disseminated to a socially desirable level by simply leaving them to the free market process. It is necessary to put in place proper systems for disseminating them.

Even if technologies have been introduced, it is possible that other new environmental problems will arise due to inappropriate management. Illegal dumping may also prevent proper waste collection and full utilization of the technologies available. It is therefore important to introduce to developing countries not only technologies that tackle the problems but also comprehensive waste management systems for utilizing the technologies, developing human resources, and creating legal systems and plans.

In other words, integrating competitive venous industries with systems for utilizing technology and human resource development is important, not only from the perspective of environmental conservation but also for striking a balance between the environment and the economy.