Nigel Carter, a 64-year-old man from Comrie, Perthshire, had collected 500 bicycles to donate to a charity in Sudan that helps people access low-cost transportation. Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA) deemed some of the bikes in the shipment unfit for purpose and refused to let them leave the country. Despite the fact that some of the bicycles needed repairs, the SEPA’s decision meant they were shipped back to the man who risked scrapping them.
Carter had collected the bicycles from recycling centers across Scotland and offered them to charities. Those not taken to Scottish charities were sent to Sudan. The bicycles were shipped in a container to a Scottish port for inspection by environment officials. The current civil war in Sudan has led to a shortage of resources, such as oil and fuel, making bicycles more valuable.
Gary Walker, a waste manager at SEPA, stated that the bikes needed repairs before they could be reused and that the repairs were necessary because the bikes were deemed waste. He had a duty, he added, to ensure that Scotland’s waste did not simply end up in another country.
In a statement, SEPA told the BBC it contacted Mr. Carter about the bike repairs before shipment and was disappointed in their condition by the time they were shipped. The statement added that SEPA was not confident that the bikes would be reused as bikes. Nevertheless, Mr. Carter said the repairs needed were minor and easily fixable in Sudan and that he thought the inspector’s decision was arbitrary. The bikes would have given children in Sudan a means of getting to school and helped adults who ran their businesses.
Mr. Carter said that the bikes would most likely be scrapped or taken back to the recycling centre, from where he had chosen them. Moreover, he said the shipping container was sitting in “limbo,” costing the Sudanese charity money and putting them at risk of closure
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