Bamako Convention on the Ban of the Import into Africa and the Control of Transboundary Movement and Management of Hazardous Wastes within Africa
Muntaka Chasant via Wikimedia Commons
Adopted by: African Union (originally Organization of African Unity) · Kind: Binding treaty · Scope: Regional (Africa) · Adopted: 1991
Africa's own binding answer to the hazardous waste trade, negotiated at Bamako in 1991 by states of the then Organization of African Unity and in force since 1998. Where the Basel Convention regulates hazardous waste movements through prior informed consent, Bamako bans the import of hazardous and radioactive waste into Africa outright, and closes the routes around that ban by prohibiting ocean and inland water dumping and incineration. It writes the precautionary principle directly into the treaty, and pairs the ban with obligations to soundly manage the waste African states generate themselves. It exists because African states did not trust Basel to stop wealthier nations exporting toxic waste to the continent.
The Bamako Convention was adopted at Bamako, Mali on 30 January 1991 by twelve nations of the then Organization of African Unity, now the African Union, and entered into force on 22 April 1998. It is not a regional restatement of the Basel Convention. It is Africa's own answer to what African states saw as Basel's failure.
The Convention's Secretariat states the origin plainly: it arose from the failure of the Basel Convention to prohibit trade of hazardous waste to less developed countries, and from the realization that many developed nations were exporting toxic wastes to Africa. The negotiation was a direct response to specific documented incidents of toxic-waste dumping in African countries during the 1980s. Holding Bamako beside Basel in this bank, the global compromise treaty and the regional treaty written because that compromise was not trusted, is more honest than holding only the first.
Where Basel regulates and permits hazardous-waste trade under conditions of prior informed consent, Bamako imposes a flat ban. The import into Africa of any hazardous or radioactive waste is prohibited outright, so parties do not get to consent their way into becoming a dumping ground. Dumping and incineration at sea and in inland waters are banned as well, which closes the routes around a simple import prohibition.
The precautionary principle is written directly into the treaty text, so uncertainty about whether a substance is harmful is not treated as licence to import or dispose of it. The ban on imports is paired with obligations for the environmentally sound management of hazardous waste already generated inside African states, so the Convention addresses the waste the continent produces as well as the waste sent to it.
It stands as one of the clearest cases in this bank of a regional bloc writing its own binding law because a global instrument did not go far enough to protect it. The complete text is published by the Bamako Convention Secretariat and in the African Union treaty repository.
Key provisions · 4 provisions
Principle 1
Unlike Basel's consent-based model, the Convention flatly prohibits the import of any hazardous or radioactive waste into Africa, so parties cannot consent their way into becoming a dumping ground.
import-ban · hazardous-waste
Principle 2
The Convention also bans ocean and inland-water dumping and incineration of hazardous waste, closing routes around a simple import prohibition.
dumping-ban · incineration-ban
Principle 3
The precautionary principle is written directly into the treaty, so uncertainty about a substance's harm is not treated as license to import or dispose of it.
precautionary-principle · uncertainty
Principle 4
The Convention pairs its import ban with obligations for African states to manage hazardous waste already generated within their own territory in an environmentally sound way.
sound-management · domestic-waste