Environmental racism pits rich against poor black communities

The movement to eradicate injustice caused when wealthy white communities use poor black ones as dumping grounds is starting to gain some traction.

This week, members of the movement even sat down with Environmental Protection Agency leaders in Georgia.

Although the EPA didn’t provide much in the way of answers at the meeting, it’s a positive step toward more people to take notice of this issue. The injustice is well documented by Robert Bullard of Clark Atlanta University, who has researched the U.S. government failures surrounding Hurricane Katrina.

Bullard told EPA officials toxins are more likely to be dumped in black, low-income communities. In one study, he found as much as 56 percent of residents living near hazardous waste facilities are minorities.

In the EPA’s statement from after the meeting, officials said there are no simple answers to the issue, but promised to look deeper into “the disproportionate burden pollution has placed on vulnerable populations.”

The problem is a major issue in the U.S., especially the south, but it’s magnified 10 fold in Africa, which some say has become Europe’s trash can.

Analyst Paul Aduljie of http:/allafrica.com calls the practice insidious and vile. “ Why won’t western nations leave Africans alone? First it was slavery, then colonialism, and now? It is environmental racism!,” he writes.

Europe’s bad habit has been thoroughly documented by New York Times reporter Elisabeth Rosenthal. In a September story, she says “Exporting waste illegally to poor countries has become a vast and growing international business, as companies try to minimize the costs of new environmental laws.”

Becoming environmentally responsible should be more than keeping your own backyard neat and tidy. Environmentalism is a global issue, and the burden should not be past along to those least able to cope with it. Unfortunately, that’s exactly what’s happening.