Who owns our trash—and why does it matter?

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Waste pickers keep untold amounts of plastic and other forms of trash out of landfills worldwide. Now, governments are beginning to recognize their value

Who owns our trash? It’s a heated question being asked by waste pickers around the world who are uniting to fight for their survival. What we throw away, they insist, should be available to all.The United States Supreme Court in 1988that household garbage is public property once it’s on the curb. That enables police to search trash for criminal evidence, but that protection hasn’t always been extended to people who collect recyclables.

“These containers are made explicitly inaccessible,” says Ryan Castalia, executive director of Sure We Can, a nonprofit recycling and community center in Brooklyn. “There’s value in the waste, and we feel that value should belong to the people, not the city or the corporations.”Josefa Marin immigrated to New York from Mexico in 1987, supporting her daughter back home with the $140 a week she earned cleaning floors at a sweater factory.

Waste picker Josefa Marin at Sure We Can, a Brooklyn non-profit recycling redemption center. Called bottle professionals by some, they collect recyclables, return them, and are paid five cents.Please be respectful of copyright. Unauthorized use is prohibited.

 

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