¡Viva Mexico!: For Some in Mexico, Trash Is a Treasure Worth Defending

NYTimes.com: " Pablo Téllez Falcón has long ruled supreme over one of the world’s largest dumps at the edge of Mexico City. He was born in garbage, he likes to say, and he intends to die there.

A few weeks ago, though, the city closed its giant Bordo Poniente landfill for good, padlocking the gate and trucking the garbage to distant new dumps. Officials have optimistically outlined fast-track strategies to recycle, burn and compost all but a fraction of the garbage that the city now generates. 

But that European-style vision of handling garbage stands in sharp relief to the needs of the 1,500 trash pickers, or pepenadores, who rely on the refuse at Bordo Poniente every day for their livelihood. “The garbage will never run out,” predicted Mr. Téllez" read more