{"id":11860,"date":"2020-12-29T11:37:11","date_gmt":"2020-12-29T08:37:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/africasustainabilitymatters.com\/?p=11860"},"modified":"2026-01-11T05:31:22","modified_gmt":"2026-01-11T05:31:22","slug":"should-you-rent-not-buy-electronics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/2020\/12\/29\/should-you-rent-not-buy-electronics\/","title":{"rendered":"Should you rent, not buy, electronics?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Laptops, phones and tablets come out in new, flashier upgrades each year, and consumers lap them up, eager to own the latest desirable models with the most cutting-edge features. But with every upgrade, older models mount up in&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.dw.com\/en\/un-electronic-waste-gold-silver-platinum\/a-54022278\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" target=\"_blank\">landfills<\/a>&nbsp;around the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In 2019, we generated a record 53.6 million metric tons of&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.dw.com\/en\/can-the-pandemic-help-us-to-embrace-refurbished-electronics\/a-53741181\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">e-waste<\/a>, according to the&nbsp;<a href=\"http:\/\/ewastemonitor.info\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Global E-waste Monitor<\/a>&nbsp;put out by United Nations University&#8217;s (UNU) \u2014 a UN research and academic institution \u2014 among other organizations. It predicts that this amount will reach 74 million tons by the end of the decade.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Apart from the sheer volume of waste piling up on trash heaps, electronics often contain toxic chemicals such as mercury and chlorofluorocarbons that can leach into the surrounding environment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Despite growing awareness of the problem, little of this waste is being\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.dw.com\/en\/china-cleans-up-electronic-recycling\/a-42570581\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">recycled<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&#8220;While consumers will often say &#8216;Yes, of course I am in favor of recycling, and yes, I recycle,&#8217; when you actually look at behaviors, it doesn&#8217;t match up with the percentages who say they would do it,&#8221; said Laura Kelly, director of the Shaping Sustainable Markets group at the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED), a London-based independent research organization. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ecowatch.com\/electronic-waste-rent-buy-2649660970.html?rebelltitem=3#rebelltitem3\">Read more&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ecowatch.com\/u\/deutschewelle\"><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Laptops, phones and tablets come out in new, flashier upgrades each year, and consumers lap them up, eager to own the latest desirable models with the most cutting-edge features. But&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":11861,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":"","pagelayer_contact_templates":[],"_pagelayer_content":"","_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[101],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11860","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-international-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11860","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11860"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11860\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11861"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11860"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11860"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11860"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}