Zambia is a land-locked country in Central/Southern Africa with a population of about 10 million people. About 1.25 million people inhabit the capital, Lusaka, with another 2 million in the northern Copperbelt region. Major pollution-related problems are due to mining and industrial waste. In 2001, Blacksmith Institute helped to found ARE, an NGO focusing on a heavily polluted industrial area on the Kafue River. The Kafue River, part of the Zambezi basin, is a source of potable water for over forty percent of Zambia's population. It is also host to wildlife and birds. For decades, industries such as copper mines, metallurgical plants, textile plants, fertilizer factories, sugar processing plants, cement factories, various agricultural activities, and the Kafue Sewage Treatment Plant (KSTP) have polluted the river. Mineral deposits, chemicals, and suspended solids have led to overgrowth of aquatic weeds, choking river life. The continuous discharge of raw sewage into the Kafue River from the KSTP has contributed to the steady supply of nutrients (ortho-phosphates, nitrates, ammonia, etc.) ensuring the proliferation of various types of weeds, like the Salvina molesta, thereby causing eutrophication. Both aquatic life and human health are in danger. High incidences of environmentally mediated disease, such as gastro-enteritis, intestinal worms, and diarrhea diseases mostly in children have been reported from communities around the river and have been linked to drinking water from certain parts of the river. The raw sewer pollution of Kafue River could inadvertently lead to outbreaks of epidemics like cholera.

Bata Tannery uses various chemicals in tanning animal skins. Amongst these chemicals is chromium sulfate, which can easily be converted to either hexavalent or trivalent chromium. The effect of these chemicals on human and aquatic life is potentially lethal. Equally, the yeast production from Lee Yeast results in high concentrations of both chemical oxygen demand (COD) and biochemical oxygen demand (BOD) in the wastewater. The net effect is the reduction in the river system's oxygen concentration, leading to toxic anaerobic conditions.

Kanpur is the ninth-largest city in India, and one of its most severely polluted. Its eastern districts feature about 350 industrial leather tanneries, many of which discharge untreated waste into local groundwater sources and the Ganges River. These pollutants include toxic levels of metal contaminants such as chromium, mercury, and arsenic. Chromium is the most worrisome of these: popular in the tanning industry because it makes leather goods stronger, its waste form--hexavalent chromium or Cr VI--is known to cause lung cancer, liver failure, kidney damage, and premature dementia. Noraiakheda, a settlement of 30,000 people within Kanpur, has developed right on top of a plume of Cr VI emitted by toxic sludge from an old chemical plant that had supported the tanneries. The sludge is a source of pollution and a danger to human health. Flammable methane trapped inside the sludge catches fire during the hot summer months, releasing harmful toxins into the air. Summer heat and winds also distribute dust particles from the sludge containing Cr VI and other toxins that are harmful when inhaled. Chromium from the sludge leaks into the river, subsoil, and groundwater - the primary source of drinking water for the surrounding community. A 1997 study conducted by the Central Pollution Control Board on the groundwater quality in Kanpur revealed Cr VI levels of 6.2 mg/L; the Indian government places the limit at .05 mg/L.

Ranipet is a medium-sized community located about 100 miles from Chennai, the fourth largest urban area in India. A factory in Ranipet manufactures sodium chromate, chromium salts and Basic Chromium Sulfate Tanning Powder used locally in the leather tanning process. The raw materials used in the process include chromate ore, limestone soda ash, sulfuric acid and soldium chlorate.

The Tamil Nadu Pollution Control Board (TNPCB) estimates that about 150,000 tons of solid wastes accumulated over two decades of plant operation are stacked in an open yard (three to five meters high and on 2 hectares of land) on the facility premises.

Tangra lies on the outskirts of Kolkata (formerly Calcutta) and was famous for its leather tanning industry.

A Supreme Court order forced the tanneries to relocate to a self-contained leather-processing complex in the Bantala area. This was in response to public interest litigation filed by environmentalists alleging that pollution from the industries exceeded the state pollution standards.

However some tanneries still exist here to this day despite relocation orders. This region has a very high water table and several wetlands around the old tannery sites. The entire area is about half a dozen city blocks in size.

Significant industrial waste is haphazardly dumped into the Meycauayan River, a source of domestic and agricultural water for 250,000 people living in and around Manila. Substantial contamination comes from small scale lead recycling facilities along the river at Marilao, and from the many tanneries that dump untreated hexavalent chromium into the river. This river also feeds directly into the Manila Bay, and its effluents contaminate shellfish in commercial fishing areas.

Meycauayan, a town about 12 miles (19 kms) north of Manila, is the tannery center of the Philippines. First established in 1903, there are now around 120 tanneries employing about 8,000 people in the area.