Much of this recycling is utilitarian. Objects are fashioned to satisfy the daily needs of those who produce and use them. Recycled cooking utensils, tools, furniture, and other functional objects fill local markets where they are bought and sold.

Traditional craft skills -- leather working, metallurgy, and blacksmithing -- are cleverly adapted to fit the burgeoning recyclers' trade. Although the discarded raw materials are quintessentially modern, the finished products often bear the imprint of age-old style, form, and tradition.

These elegant water vessels are similar in size and shape to the more costly ones made from riveted copper.

In the port of Dakar, Senegal, a developing economy has created a market for hundreds of individuals who "make do" by finding new uses for broken or worn-out products. Assane Faye is one such recycling entrepreneur who makes and sells briefcases, jewelry boxes, trunks, and toys cut from scavenged tin cans or misprinted metal sheeting from a local canning factory.

Mr. Faye, like all successful businessmen, is acutely aware of the aesthetic choices and demands of his varied clientele. Although he prefers the ease, durability, and convenience of metal sheeting to make his products, he recognizes that some local customers and foreign tourists are attracted to the more colorful -- and visually ironic -- malletes made from a collage of recognizeable recycled cans.