It’s a common fact now that mobile phone recycling is good for the environment and for business.
Recycling old mobiles stops them from going to landfill, and most of the materials that make up a mobile phone can be reused. Mobile phones are made up of many components containing plastics, glass and precious metals.
When recycled, these materials can be used to make new things, such as plastic pallets, furniture and pipes.
Apparently, if all the gold from 80,000 old phones was recycled, one gold bar could be created.
Consumer awareness of the need for mobile phone recycling is increasing and countries in Asia are now also taking part in recycling programmes.
However, recycling the materials from old mobiles is not the only factor in the recycling cycle. Many companies who recycle old phones are relocating their factories to reduce their carbon footprint.
The Vice President for Nokia’s Sales for Southeast Asia Pacific said: “We are building factories closer to the growth markets…With a scale that Nokia has, we will soon have 10 factories located around the world. (We) recently (announced) a new factory in Vietnam. One of the reasons we chose that location, of course, was proximity, also to our component suppliers. Again, we could make use of road transportation as opposed to flying components around the world, and again reducing our carbon footprint.”