When we throw things ‘away’, what does that actually mean? Where does it go, and who deals with it when it gets there? Award-winning journalist Oliver Franklin-Wallis has spent the last number of years investigating the global waste industry. On June 27 he comes to Intelligence Squared to tell us the truth about Britain’s overflowing sewers and hollowed-out mining towns, the mountainous landfills of New Delhi, Ghana’s flooded second-hand markets and what it all means for the future.

He will tell us about the people on the frontline of our waste crisis – both those being exploited, and those determined to make a difference. On the way, we will discover the corporate greenwashing that started the recycling movement; the dark truth behind our second-hand donations; and come face to face with the 10,000-year legacy of our nuclear waste.