Crouched between mountains of discarded plastic, 64-year-old Lanh fights a losing battle against a technicolour tide of trash that threatens to swallow her village whole. Amidst the fumes, she strips labels off bottles of Coke, Evian, and local tea drinks, preparing them to be melted into pellets for a global market that rarely sees the human cost of its waste.

While this scene unfolds in Xa Cau, Vietnam, it mirrors a crisis familiar to any Kenyan who has walked past the burning fringes of a dumpsite. The plight of these "craft villages" exposes the lethal gap between rapid consumption and the capacity to manage it safely, serving as a cautionary tale for fast-growing economies grappling with the environmental bill of industrialization.

The Paradox of Profit and Poison

Xa Cau is just one of hundreds of recycling hubs encircling Vietnam's capital, Hanoi. Here, waste is not merely trash; it is a livelihood. These villages process a significant portion of the 1.8 million tonnes of plastic waste Vietnam produces annually. For workers like Lanh, who requested her full name be withheld, the industry provides essential wages in a region where economic opportunities can be scarce.

However, this financial lifeline comes with a toxic catch. The recycling process is largely unregulated, relying on primitive technology that spews noxious fumes into the air and leaches chemicals into the soil. "This job is extremely dirty. The environmental pollution is really severe," Lanh admitted to AFP, voicing a fear common among the workforce: that the very work keeping them alive is slowly killing them.

A Global Warning

The situation in Vietnam presents a stark parallel to the challenges facing Kenya’s waste management sector. Much like the informal waste pickers in Nairobi, the workers in Hanoi operate in a grey zone—essential to the ecosystem yet unprotected by labor laws or safety standards. Experts highlight several critical failures in this model:

• Lack of Infrastructure: Plastic disposal has outpaced the government's ability to collect and sort waste formally.
• Health Hazards: Workers are exposed to respiratory illnesses and toxic microplastics without protective gear.
• Environmental Degradation: Unchecked runoff pollutes local rivers, impacting agriculture and water safety for the wider community.

While Kenya has taken strides with its strict ban on single-use plastics, the global demand for recycling often pushes the burden onto the world's most vulnerable populations. As Lanh continues her work in the shadow of the plastic mountains, her reality serves as a grim reminder: without systemic change and strict regulation, the circular economy remains a broken circle.