Scavenging the city

A while ago, the Dutch government had extended the types of products that fall under the deposit requirement. Previously most common types of plastic beverage bottles would be required to include a 20 cent deposit which would be returned to you at the collection station. Now, most aluminium beverage cans fall under this policy.

Following this development, a new phenomenon has occured. The urban poor and homeless have gained a new business case so to say, when scavenging for these containers had become more economical than other means of acquiring money. Some have even started professionalizing. For example by wearing head-worn lights to be able to see better into the darkness of trash containers. Large events where lots of drinking happen are very lucrative. As the scavengers provide the service of taking peoples’ trash out of their hands and in return earning a tidy sum. Collecting 50 cans amounts to about 10 euro’s in deposits.

While this policy has presented new opportunities in the informal economy, there are some downsides. First of all, trash bins are most of the time not properly closed which allows birds to tear the bags inside apart and spread trash all over the street. This is very common and a source of frustration for people. Secondly, I can ask the question if it is okay for people to have to go through others’ trash for not-very-valuable items. I am curious to know the position of the scavengers on this. Is it more dignified work than asking for change at the metro station?

I recently became interested in scavenging myself. Through an article I had read about people who collect discarded rechargable vapes in order to harvest their batteries to use for electronics projects. This naturally peaked my interest as LiPo batteries can be quite expensive when bought new. So, I started paying more attention to the ground around me. Taking more detours. The catch so far has been zero. Apart from a broken wireless earbud which I brought home to harvest the speaker and microphone from.

Though my scavenging trips have not yielded many components for my projects, it did make me more aware of the public space around me. A fresh perspective is often gained when looking for something and finding another thing along the way. I may not have found the battery I was looking for, but I did gain a fresh lens to view the city through: as space that presents opportunity and is able to be harvested.