Recycling items makes sense in our environmentally conscious world. In the developing world it is a messy and dangerous business because there are usually no convenient local recycling agencies that provide householders with different containers to dispose of different items. Everything is collected and then sorted at rubbish collection points or worse, at the dumps and landfill sites themselves. The sorting is usually done by the poorest members of society with the vast majority being children. They are put in harm's way daily from heavy machinery operating at these sites and from sorting through toxic substances and items containing them, which have been thrown out with the rubbish.

In the developed world we have it so much easier. We pack our rubbish neatly into various containers according to type; glass, metal, plastic, paper and clothes. There has always been money to be made in the scrap or ‘rag and bone' business and today is no different, just more organized, with big companies making profits.

When it comes to electrical and electronic items, we must be more careful as they contain toxic or corrosive elements that should never be put into the general rubbish. Many supermarkets now have special bins for disposal of spent batteries: all we have to do is remember to take our batteries there and resist the temptation just to throw them in the rubbish. Electrical items can be safely disposed of at local recycling centres.

The easiest way of disposing of old mobile phones is to check online and then send them to us, Mazuma Mobile, who takes phones for cash. We then recycle mobile phones in two ways; either by sending them to developing countries to be used, or by breaking them down into their component parts and selling these on. Mobile phone recycling is the sensible way to dispose of your old mobile phone.