In which country are people most likely to repair their phones?

What happens when your cell phone dies? Which country's residents would most like to recycle them? Do people usually repair their phones or just throw them away?

Chih An Lee of Greenpeace conducted a survey of phone repairs around the world to find out these questions.

So, believe it or not, the humble smartphone has a huge impact on our environment, from its manufacture to its disposal in the vast e-waste pile. That's why a couple of years ago, Ipsos MORI conducted a survey in six countries: the United States, Germany, Russia, Mexico, South Korea and China. We wanted to find out what people are looking for in a smartphone and what their habits are - do they repair them b

And the findings were surprising!

Many people felt that the world releases too many new phone models

More than half of those surveyed believe that mobile phone manufacturers release TOO many new models and agree that they could live with changing their mobile phone models less often.

Who should recycle a phone when it dies: the user or the company that made it?

What to do when the phone time runs out? Does it end up in the trash, maybe some e-waste site, or is it recycled and reused?

Almost half of respondents across all countries believed that mobile phone manufacturers are more responsible for providing recycling access to their customers. Wouldn't it be great if companies made recycling as easy as possible, from the creation of the device to the collection for reuse?

Almost everyone wanted a longer-lasting cell phone

A group of volunteers attended a smartphone repair class at Greenpeace's Mexico office, led by local phone group Fix Friends. It seemed obvious to them. 4 out of 5 respondents thought it was important for a new smartphone to be easy to repair. In China, this figure is as high as 95%, in Mexico - 94%, and in South Korea - 92%.

However, almost three million tonnes of e-waste is generated from small IT products like mobile phones alone, so it still seems like a lot will be wasted!

China leads the world in repairing its own phones!

…Well, at least from the six countries surveyed! Respondents in China (66%) and Korea (64%) were found to be more likely to repair their phones compared to respondents in the US (28%) and Germany (23%).

Does your smartphone contain dangerous chemicals? No thanks!

You probably didn't know that many dangerous chemicals are used to make your smartphone. For example, some hazardous chemicals used in manufacturing processes are carcinogenic, while others can cause various adverse health effects.

4 out of 5 respondents thought it was important that a new smartphone was made without the use of hazardous chemicals.

So what does it all mean?

It seems that most people in the world are tired of how easily phones are thrown away these days, and they are also tired of the never-ending cycle of new trends. But really, we just want a phone that will serve us faithfully, be easy to repair, and easy to recycle. Also, we don't want it to be made with nasty dangerous chemicals or after s

By Chih An Lee, Greenpeace East Asia

See more: Phone repair prices