Nigerian Communications Act 2003 empowers Commission to develop regulations on E-waste- Danbatta

• As NCC subscribes to NESREA’s Extended Producer Responsibility programme

 

Indication has emerged that the Nigerian Communications Act 2003 by virtue of Sections 4 and 70 empowers the Commission to develop regulations on E-waste.

The Executive Vice Chairman/Chief Executive Officer, Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), Prof. Umar Garba Danbatta made this position known in his speech delivered at the 2nd ITRealms E-Waste Dialogue, with the theme ‘E-Waste in Nigeria: Consumer as key to Circular Economy & 20 years of GSM’ held on Thursday, December 9, 2021 at Adam’s Hall, Welcome Centre Hotels, Int’l Airport Road, Lagos.

Prof. Danbatta, who was represented by the Head of New Media, Dr. Ominiyi Ibietan, dwelt on “20 years of GSM and e-Waste in Nigeria,” adding that the Nigerian Communications Commission, had in pursuant to its powers under Section 70 of the Nigerian Communications Act 2003 on the 5th day of March 2019, concluded the development of the draft E-waste Regulations and the draft Disaster Recovery Guidelines for the telecommunications industry.

“Based on the Commission’s participatory rule-making procedure, the E-waste Regulations and Disaster Recovery Guidelines were before then published on its website for comments from the general public, especially telecommunications operators and other stakeholders.

“As required by law, a Public Inquiry on the E-waste Regulations and Disaster Recovery Guidelines was scheduled for March 5, 2019 and a Notice of the Public Inquiry was published in Daily Trust and New Telegraph Newspapers on Monday February 11, 2019.

“It’s on record that however, the Commission did not receive any comments from operators and stakeholders prior to the Public Inquiry of March 5, 2019.

“Permit me to share some historical perspective to this inquiry which held as scheduled at the Conference Hall of the Commission commencing at 11:13am and was chaired by my humble self as the Executive Vice Chairman, with staff of the Commission and over Sixty-one (61) persons representing telecommunications operators, interested stakeholders and the media in attendance.

“I used the opportunity to explain the importance of having a proper legal framework to regulate e-waste in the telecommunications sector, considering that e-waste is the fastest growing waste stream in the world and a recent report by the World Economic Forum (WEF), which estimated that this waste stream increased by about 48.5 million tonnes in 2018,” EVC said.

He described the e-waste as “electrical or electronic equipment that is waste, including all components, sub-assemblies and consumables that are part of the equipment at the time the equipment becomes waste.”

According to him,  based on the WEF, over 75% of electronics imported into Nigeria were irreparable and toxic junk, which means that this menace remained rampant due to the low Gross Domestic Product (GDP) per capita/low income and the desperate quest for information by Nigerians.

He noted that the prevalence of e-waste raised a lot of pollution issues which should be managed, because of the resultant effects on humans and the environment.

The Commission, he said, in line with its commitment to sustain phenomenal successes recorded in the sector in the past 20 years, also developed the ‘Disaster Recovery Guidelines’ to mitigate disasters that might affect business continuity in the industry and jeopardise the incredible success already recorded.

He pointed out that the Guidelines were part of the Commission’s wider risk management initiatives, aimed at protecting telecoms companies from the threat of emergencies in their operations as well as enhancing the development of the industry and the entire economy.

In his words: “The Regulations is made up of Thirty-One (31) regulations structured into Sixteen (16) parts. Also included in the Regulations are one (1) Schedule, nine (9) Forms and four (4) Tables. The Regulations outlined the responsibilities and obligations of stakeholders in the e-waste value chain, such as the manufacturer, collection and disposal facilities agent, vendors, consumers or bulk consumers, recyclers, importers and transporters.

“Notable, is that the Regulations apply to all type-approved Electrical and Electronic Equipment and activities carried out by any person in relation to Electrical and Electronic Equipment used in the telecommunication industry in Nigeria.

“The Guidelines comprises Ten (10) paragraphs which are structured into five (5) parts, two (2) Schedules and one (1) Annexure. The Guidelines, applies to all Communications Network Facilities and Service Providers in Nigeria, seeks to address the major causes of communications system failures such as emergencies, disasters, terrorist or cyber-attacks, loss of infrastructure and network congestion.”

The EVC recalled that in the cause of the public inquiry earlier hosted for the purpose of drafting regulations held at the Commission in this regard, contributions were made by MTN Nigeria Communications Limited, National Environmental Standards and Regulations Enforcement Agency (NESREA), ATC Wireless Nigeria Limited and a representative from the Association of Non-Governmental Organisations in Nigeria, among others.

He highlighted some of NCC’s e-waste regulations to include: 1. Responsibilities of Telecommunications Operators

The role(s) to be played by telecommunications operators depend on their status at any given point in time. Although not explicitly mentioned and assigned any specific responsibilities, telecommunications operators adequately fit into and are covered under any of the identified stakeholders in the E-waste value-chain in Parts II-VIII and also adequately covered by definitions in Regulations 30 of the Regulations, to wit: bulk consumer, consumer, distributor, e-retailer, importer, operator, manufacturer, vendor etc.

2. Susceptible Overlap of E-waste Regulations with National Environmental (Electrical/Electronic Sector) Regulations (NER).

He said that it is essential to note that sector specific rules can be made, even where a national rule of general application has been made on the same issue.

He noted that the E-waste Regulations are not a duplication of the National Environmental (Electrical/Electronic Sector) Regulations (NER), as it addresses issues that pertain to the telecommunications sector.

The EVC NCC argued that though NESREA is saddled with the responsibility of setting and enforcing standards for environmental protection in Nigeria, there is nothing under its establishing Act that suggests that it is the only agency or government institution with mandate on the legal regimes on matters related to the environment and public safety.

This regime, he said, is administered by an array of institutions and the power to do so is connected to their principal powers or functions, supported by the enabling laws creating them.

“Thus, NCC benefits from this window and is enabled to make regulations on matters related to E-waste and other related issues, pursuant to the provisions of Sections 4, 70, 132 to be in conjunction with Sections 130 and 134 of the Nigerian Communications Act, 2003.

“Also, nowhere in the NESREA Act, is any mention or reference made by name or explanation in relation to the telecommunications sector. It is important, therefore, to state that matters of quality, specifications, standard and performance indicators of Type Approved-Electrical and Electronic Equipment (EEE) relates not only to the safety of the equipment in relation to customers alone, but the general public and the environment at large.

“It will therefore not be out of place for an agency that is principally empowered to make regulations in relation to Type Approve EEE that enters into Nigeria; to regulate the life cycle of such Type Approve EEE by imposing responsibilities for its management on stakeholder within the value chain end-to-end.

“NCC like most stakeholders have already subscribed to NESREA’s Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) programme, which has provisions likely to overlap with those contained in the E-waste Regulations,” he emphasized.

He affirmed that the Commission’s EPR implementation regime presents a more realistic and clearly defined collective system of collection and management of E-waste to address Nigeria’s peculiarities in E-waste chain collection mechanism.

Accordingly, there is a clearly set out rich procedure, channel or mechanism for the implementation of the EPR approach to ensure efficient channelization of E-waste that will prevent leakages (the mechanism of ‘channelization’ of Type Approved Electrical and Electronic Equipment (EEE) from the producer down to the consumer and from the consumer up to the producer [end to end]).

Speaking on recyclers, he said “they have been adequately identified and responsibilities assigned to in the E-waste value chain. An instance is the responsibilities of manufacturers, covered under the Regulation 3(d)(ii) that imposes on the manufacturer the responsibility of setting up a collection system that will allow distributors and retailers to accept any Electrical and Electronic Equipment (EEE) which has reached its end of life from all private household and final holders free of charge.”

On the issue of incentives, he noted that it is purely discretional and could be addressed through administrative policy or executive orders, without the necessity of stipulating it as a legal provision in legislation for now.

Speaking on responsibility of Importers, the NCC boss declared that the Regulation 8(1) recognised bulk EEE users such as infrastructure companies (INFRACOs) except in the proviso to Regulations 1. “…Provided that the manufacture and supply of EEE use for national defence, security and other similar strategic applications shall be excluded from provisions of these Regulations.”

He further stated that the above may require operators/importers to submit Form EEE 5 as contained under Regulation 8(3) for all types of shipment of EEE to be used by them, since Regulation 8(6) prohibits importation of EEE containing any toxic or hazardous substance, thereby backing-up the likes of lead and lithium ion batteries by this provision.

He buttressed on the efforts at reducing the use of hazardous substances, adding that there is no conflict between NER and NCC’s E-Waste Regulation 17(7) which flows from the enabling regulatory powers of the Commission to make Regulations in relation to Type Approved-EEE imported in Nigeria.

He asserted that any issue surrounding implementation is a technical matter which is flexible because of the innovative nature of technology, adding that  it is safe to leave it open to policy guidelines, which may change from time to time, given the circumstance and technology involved.

In affirmation to enthrone sanity in the E-Waste value chain, the Commission, he said, will evolve strategies to monitor compliance and these strategies may change from time to time, more so, as part of monitoring mechanism, the E-waste Regulations have provisions dealing with licensing and permits requirements.

Consequently, in implementing these guidelines, NCC, he noted sees this as presenting a more robust, well-structured, easy to key-in and sector specific emergency telecommunication infrastructural recovery plan, built on the four pillars, namely; The Emergency responses; Restoration and repair; Reconstruction of the destroyed for functional replacement, and Reconstruction for redevelopment.

“Our E-Waste Regulation 2019 was part of the responses to the policy goals of NCC towards harnessing the immense socio-economic benefits around Electrical and Electronic Equipment (EEE) for national development, hence our participation at the ITREALMS E-Waste Dialogue is a part of telecom consumer awareness of the commission in our realization that consumer is the key to circular economy, let alone at this digital era that has spanned two decades this year,” EVC NCC said.

Danbatta revealed that the progress the telecom sector made in the last 20 years of the Global System for Mobile (GSM) communications cannot have been successfully achieved without the roles of telecom consumers, who have the needs to continuously demand for a better service as technology evolves and discarding previous devices where necessary to enjoy an optimal service delivery.

“Nigeria as at October 2021 has a total of 300,901,401 connected subscriber lines of telecommunications services; with active lines standing at 191,951,769. The implication of this is that the outlook is bright; these lines are connected on one device or another and more telecommunications services are expected with the determined licensing of the Fifth-Generation (5G) networks by the Federal Government of Nigeria through the Commission.

“As we await the 5G networks, we see no telecom consumer relenting in cashing in on the rave of this technology which may invariably require some changes and upgrades in devices, thereby making the earlier ones somewhat obsolete depending on the compatibility of devices already in use,” he further stated.

The Commission, he noted, has a clear ambition to ensure that the Digital Economy Policy of the Federal Government is accomplished and one of the instruments for the realization of this is the availability of a healthy information and communication network in the country. “This cannot be achieved with an environment where Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) are unregulated,” he said.

He identified the unique benefits and the role 5G can play in accomplishing the objectives of the digital economy, as well as the plan to facilitate the deployment of 5G technology in Nigeria.

He stated that 5G Technology will initiate several new changes in mobile connectivity with an enormous capacity to boost productivity and grow the economy, stressing that these are the key reasons behind the Commissions drive to ensure the deployment of 5G in Nigeria in line with its avowed transparency.

“5G represents the fifth generation in mobile communications evolution and an incremental deployment is expected over the following decade and has been designed to be a system of systems that will bring flexibility to mobile, fixed and broadcast networks and support more extensive data requirements.

“The technology will impact on the way interactions are done by enabling in some cases unforeseen business models, enhanced lifestyles, all resulting in increased productivity. Some of the technologies already being touted include automated cars and advanced manufacturing, Internet of things (IoT) which will enable thousands of connected devices, such as smart energy meters, work together and share information. These changes and innovation have enormous economic benefits.

“For instance, IHS Economics estimated that 5G would enable USD$12.3 trillion of global economic output in 2035, in addition for it being most beneficial to the nation and the end users, the telecom consumers,” he revealed.

Prof Danbatta,  congratulated the Group Executive Editor-in-chief of ITREALMS Media group, the publishers of ITREALMS Online, NaijaAgroNet and DigitalSENSE Business News, Mr. Remmy Nweke and his team; for taking a decision to examine the waste associated with deployment and use of the electrical and electronic equipment, cutting across mobile phones, computers, TV-sets, and fridges, among other electronic devices that have become the fastest growing waste streams traversing the world today; to enable the commission streamline already existing government policies and set relevant agenda where it matters most.

He pledged that the Commission will continue to do everything possible to support this kind of initiative so as to ensure that more and more Nigerians especially the stakeholders understand the efforts of the Commission as the telecom sector continues to soar.