What Happens to the Old Mobile Phone Models?

I was always curious about the end of damaged and / or old model cell phones once people threw them away in the trash cans. I assumed they could be scrapped and their parts reused for maintenance purposes. Plus, with the fast evolution of technology, we are replacing old models at even faster rates. This also raised some more questions in my mind as to who should be responsible for the way they should be handled after the end of their useful lives.

After searching for some articles online, I stumbled onto two articles “Where Do Old Cellphones Go to Die” (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/05/ opinion/sunday/where-do-old-cellphones-go-to-die.html?_r=0) and “E-waste: Whose responsibility?” (https://itunews.itu.int/en/1940-E-waste-Whose-responsibility.note.aspx) helped me answer some of my own questions.

At the end of the day, it is evident that it is responsibility of all the stakeholders (i.e. government, customers, manufacturers...) to consider the impact of the product from birth till death.  However, the manufacturers must take a greater share of the responsibility and take appropriate measures as they control which materials and processes to be used.