Human activities, such as industrial, agricultural, and domestic pursuits, discharge effluents into riverine ecological systems that contains aquatic resources, such as fish, which are also used by humans. We conducted case studies in Malaysia to investigate the impacts of these human activities on water and fish resources, as well as on human well-being from an ergonomics perspective. This research shows that a green ergonomics approach can provide us with useful insights into sustainable relationships between humans and ecology in facilitating human well-being in consideration of the overall performance of the social-ecological system. Heavy metal concentrations contained in the effluents pollute river water and contaminate fish, eventually creating significant health risks and economic costs for residents, including the polluters. The study suggests a number of policy interventions to change human behavior and achieve greater collaboration between various levels of government, academia, civil society, and businesses to help establish sustainable relationships between humans and ecology in Malaysia.
E-waste, or waste generated from electrical and electronic equipment, is considered as one of the fastest-growing waste categories, growing at a rate of 3-5% per year in the world. In 2016, 44.7 million tonnes of e-waste were generated in the world, which is equivalent to 6.1 kg for each person. E-waste is classified as a hazardous waste, but unlike other categories, e-waste also has significant potential for value recovery. As a result it is traded significantly between the developed and developing world, both as waste for disposal and as a resource for metal recovery. Only 20% of global e-waste in 2016 was properly recycled or disposed of, with the fate of the remaining 80% undocumented - likely to be dumped, traded or recycled under inferior conditions. This review paper provides an overview of the global e-waste resource and identifies the major challenges in the sector in terms of generation, global trade and waste management strategies. It lists the specific hazards associated with this type of waste that need to be taken into account in its management and includes a detailed overview of technologies employed or proposed for the recovery of value from e-waste. On the basis of this overview the paper identifies future directions for effective e-waste processing towards sustainable waste/resource management. It becomes clear that there is a strong divide between developed and developing countries with regard to this sector. While value recovery is practiced in centralised facilities employing advanced technologies in a highly regulated industrial environment in the developed world, in the developing world such recovery is practiced in a largely unregulated artisanal industry employing simplistic, labour intensive and environmentally hazardous approaches. Thus value is generated safely in the hi-tech environment of the developed world, whereas environmental burdens associated with exported waste and residual waste from simplistic processing remain largely in developing countries. It is argued that given the breadth of available technologies, a more systematic evaluation of the entire e-waste value chain needs to be conducted with a view to establishing integrated management of this resource (in terms of well-regulated value recovery and final residue disposal) at the appropriately local rather than global scale.