Looking down an empty backstreet. There is a shopping cart half full of plastic and other waste in the foreground. Beyond him, a man is going through a garbage bin.
Community, Waste

Green Goals, Hidden Harms

By Amy Romer, Megaphone Magazine, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

The City of Vancouver has built its reputation on ambitious environmental goals, aiming to become one of the greenest cities in the world. Yet, the rise of the green economy has brought unforeseen challenges for street vendors who rely on the trade of second-hand goods. 

The Binners Project is a Vancouver-based social and circular-economic initiative that supports marginalized people who collect and return recyclable materials, otherwise known as “binners.” For the past two years, the project has operated a low-barrier street market, currently at 305 Main St. in the heart of the Downtown Eastside. 

Binners Project Director Sean Miles says he’s witnessed the harm of policies such as the city’s twice-daily street sweeps that blaze through East Hastings seven days a week.

“The ironic thing about it is that you’ve got city crews coming through and basically just throwing whatever they find on the street into landfill, without any consideration of whether it’s someone’s stuff or even that it could be potentially reused,” said Miles.

The city tells Vancouverites it’s helping to “improve the lives of low-income residents” through strategies such as the contentious Downtown Eastside Plan. But street sweeps contradict the plan by negatively impacting street vendors and unhoused residents. Street sweeps also contradict Vancouver’s Greenest City Action Plan, which highlights waste reduction as one of its key focus areas.

And often, the subtext of creating a green city means maintaining a “clean” city, with unhoused and low-income residents being literally swept aside.

Miles says that Vancouver’s strategies and efforts don’t usually consider the impact on people living in poverty.

“The plastic bags ban was generally well-approved by the public, but the amount of people we know in these communities that use, and reuse, plastic bags as a primary source of storage — it’s often rarely looked at from an intersectional lens,” he said.

Kate Parizeau, a professor at the University of Guelph whose research looks at “the social life of waste,” told Megaphone that the growing commercialization of the reuse industry — driven by trendy thrift and vintage fashion stores — could be squeezing out vulnerable populations.

“It’s good for climate change, but bad for street sellers,” she said of the growing appeal of second-hand shopping.

Mike McNeeley, a Megaphone vendor and writer who also works for the Binners Project, says he’s definitely noticed the change in recent years, with fewer items available for binners to retrieve.

McNeeley also wonders if the trend is contributing to more desperation on the streets.

“People are being forced into compromising their values in order to survive,” he said.

“The arrival of Poshmark to Canada in 2019, followed by the pandemic, only intensified this shift, accelerating the new-to-you market as people increasingly bought and sold items from the comfort of their homes, further sidelining street vendors.

“We’re still consuming way too much,” said Parizeau, who noted that despite the trend towards second-hand items, fast fashion continues to be on the rise. “This could mean more street selling,” she said.

But according to Miles, one of his Binners Project street vendors says she has to travel further and further away from Vancouver just to find decent clothing she can afford to buy and resell at her market that hasn’t already been picked up by the commercialized reuse industry.

“The rise of online shopping and then the commercialized marketplace makes it that much harder for street vendors to find those items to resell them,” said Miles.

At the same time, he says, clothing banks are being used less than ever before, suggesting consumers are keeping their items, or selling them. 

“It’s a tough one,” said Miles. “It would be interesting to see if there’s a way to find out if there’s less being thrown out, which means there’s fewer things entering the circular economy.”  

Top image credit: People who collect reusable materials to earn extra money or to use themselves are a familiar sight in Vancouver, but it’s becoming increasingly difficult for people living in poverty to find items due to a bigger push towards ‘green’ initiatives. Photo by Lani Brunn.

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