Recycling impacts both positively and negatively to economic and environmental phenomena of the world we live. For instance, for both manufacturers and consumers, recycling products are cheaper than virgin ones (Howard, 1995). This helps manufacturers and consumers to save money through passed along savings. Recycling contributes to removing non-organic wastes that do not decompose from landfills healing ugly waste dumpsites. There is no space to store trash, and the accumulated waste must be eliminated from landfills.
Recycling helps farmers, companies, and manufacturers to reduce the cost of reduces farming, manufacturing and producing goods. For manufacturers, recycling contributes to reducing energy consumption, an economic advantage to them. Recycling and reusing of items use less energy than manufacturing other products from new sources. For instance, making paper using a recycled pulp uses less much energy than using a new wood. Farmers can earn money and save a lot by recycling leaves and grass in their farms by making homemade compost manure other than buying fertilizers. This saving of money ultimately helps the environment as soils are not contaminated with inorganic compounds in the name of fertilizers.
Recycling minimizes the need for raw materials, thus less mining, quarrying and logging activities are done. Quarrying, Mining, and logging destroy natural habitats of wildlife and cause environmentally-health related problems to local people (Worrell & Reuter, 2014). Also, use of fossil fuels to transport the raw materials has a negative impact on the environment.
Recycling decrease and eradicate air pollution, particularly in landfills where wastes emit gases during rotting process polluting the environment. Reducing items from the landfills reduce pollution that they cause. Recycling the products typically emits much less carbon, reducing the carbon footprint of a product. Dangerous waste items such as broken glass, pieces of metals, plastics that can cause injuries to children are removed from the landfills reducing the risk of injuries to children.
Recycling helps to alleviate global warming and the ill effects that it cause. If waste materials are burned other than recycled, they emit greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide and CFCs. Recycling prevents burning, and every waste is regenerated as a useful product without harming the environment. Industries burn fewer fossil fuels for eco-friendly products thus fewer greenhouse gasses are produced. Recycling promotes the judicial use of resources. There is indiscriminate consumption of natural resources. It as well creates green jobs to workers and industries.
As recycling cannot be perfectly positive, there are drawbacks associated with it. It is not always cost effective as sometime there is a need to create separate industries to fabricate reusable goods, at this time, more pollution is expected. Also, the recycled products cannot last for long as virgin ones would last. Such products are manufactured of trashed waste, picked up from landfills, fragile or overused. Recycling is unhygienic and vulnerable to contracting ailments due to unsafe dumbing sites. Debris in these sites can spread diseases and dangers of the toxic chemical.
Setting up a recycling plant requires a huge initial capital. That is why most people opt burning waste. Massive utility vehicles (trucks), education of residents about the benefits of cycling by organizing seminars and multiple workshops may be expensive that less can afford.
Finally, after analyzing the pros and cons of recycling, it is well found that recycling is always an important exercise to do. Understanding the economic and environmental effects of recycling is important on a large scale that if done effectively it brings mass positive results, advantageous to the mutual existence of humankind and the environment.
References
Howard, R. C. (1995). The technology of paper recycling. London: Blackie Academic & Professional.
Worrell, E., & Reuter, M. A. (2014). Handbook of recycling: State-of-the-art for practitioners, analysts, and scientists. Waltham, Mass: Elsevier.
