Building a circular plastics economy with informal waste pickers: Recyclate quality, business model, and societal impacts

Markus Gall,Melanie Wiener,Cintia Chagas De Oliveira,Reinhold W Lang,Erik G Hansen

doi:10.1016/j.resconrec.2020.104685

Markus Gall, Melanie Wiener + Show 3 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.resconrec.2020.104685

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Abstract

The circular economy rationale is increasingly promoted as a means to move from a global plastic waste dilemma to a plastics economy that is aligned with the principles of sustainable development. However, any such effort will have to account for the socio-economic settings in low-income and middle-income countries of the global south which are the main entry points of mismanaged plastic wastes into the environment. Since waste management and recycling in these economies are characterized by a great degree of informality, there is an urgent need to find models for partnering with the informal recycling sector in an effective, scalable, and sustainable manner. In this work, we present the case of a for-profit company located in Nairobi, Kenya, that operates on the interface between formal and informal by processing post-consumer plastics sourced from local waste pickers through a fair-trade-like business model.Economic incentives, trust building measures, and a general willingness to learn and adapt were identified as prerequisites for establishing accountable supplier-buyer relationships. The combination of informed material pre-sorting by the individual waste picker and subsequent industrial scale sorting and washing resulted in recyclates that were comparable to commercially available benchmark recyclates from the sophisticated formal recycling system of a high-income country in terms of both composition and selected engineering properties. High-quality mechanical recycling of plastic wastes under informal conditions seems feasible and may even come along with socio-economic benefits for marginalized waste pickers when suitable modes of cooperation are put in place.

Highlights

IntroductionThe circular economy (CE) concept has received considerable interest in academia (Babbitt et al, 2018; Geissdoerfer et al, 2017; Ghisellini et al, 2016; Kalmykova et al, 2018; Bocken et al, 2016; Alcayaga et al, 2019)
The circular economy rationale is increasingly promoted as a means to move from a global plastic waste dilemma to a plastics economy that is aligned with the principles of sustainable development
We present the case of a for-profit company located in Nairobi, Kenya, that operates on the interface between formal and informal by processing post-consumer plastics sourced from local waste pickers through a fair-trade-like business model

Summary

Introduction

The circular economy (CE) concept has received considerable interest in academia (Babbitt et al, 2018; Geissdoerfer et al, 2017; Ghisellini et al, 2016; Kalmykova et al, 2018; Bocken et al, 2016; Alcayaga et al, 2019) It abandons the idea of products and materials ever becoming waste and instead envisions “an economic system that replaces the ‘end-of-life’ concept with reducing, alternatively reusing, recycling and recovering materials in production/distribution and consumption processes. It operates at the micro level (products, companies, consumers), meso level (eco-industrial parks) and macro level (city, region, nation and beyond), with the aim to accomplish sustainable development, simultaneously creating environmental quality, economic prosperity and social equity, to the benefit of current and future generations. Plastics in particular have emerged as an intensively discussed material class in this context (European Commission, 2018; Hahladakis and Iacovidou, 2018; Leslie et al, 2016; PlasticsEurope et al, 2018; van Eygen et al, 2018; World Economic Forum and Ellen MacArthur Foundation, 2017) due to their association with single-use products, take-make-dispose consumption patterns, and the multiple facets of the global plastic waste dilemma (Brooks et al, 2018; Jambeck et al, 2015; Rochman et al, 2013; Thompson et al, 2009)

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