>Their is no reason why hundreds of millions of these less-poor folk can't do it. Rwanda doesn't have the same problem with poverty and garbage as the countrie

>Their is no reason why hundreds of millions of these less-poor folk can't do it. Rwanda doesn't have the same problem with poverty and garbage as the countries I listed, and it's tiny compared to them. Specifically, the issue contributing to pollution here is that the countries in question have: * Lots of people in poverty, and an upper class that are not * Industries offshored from richer nations * Significant amounts of trash being produced locally or taken in from other countries (usually via barge or sea traffic) * Lax environmental enforcement that either doesn't restrict or is overwhelmed by the number of people polluting who are just trying to survive It's not about having a plan... it's more about being able live another day. The problem isn't that they want to be poor, it's that their governments keep them that way and don't care about the environment or their welfare as long as their power is maintained. The best option for a lot of the poor is picking through garbage from richer people, either from other countries or their own. There are so many people in the Philippines who literally eat food made from the remains of other people's meals they find in the garbage and re-use that it has a name - Pagpag. If you're poor enough to eat that way, disposing of other people's garbage in an environmentally sound way is pretty far down the priority list. The best solution apart from common sense measures and laws controlling what waste can be exported and what has to happen to it is probably to buy plastic bottles from those poor people... they get money and live better, we get plastic sorted into types for recycling processes.