As part of a circular economy scheme, hundreds of desks made out of recycled plastics have been given to schools in South Africa.
In July this year, “The Virtuous Circle” circular economy project revealed that over 500 double school desks, constructed using recycled plastics, would be delivered to primary schools across South Africa during the final term of the school year.
Thanks to a breakthrough in recycling technology, “made possible by this multi-stakeholder circular economy partnership”, the last batch of desks would be made entirely out of recycled waste derived from “multimaterial household packaging waste.”
“The Virtuous Circle” unites both businesses and civil society organisations from Europe and South Africa with the aim of developing new circular economy solutions for multilayer waste. The scheme also seeks to educate children on the importance of “nutrition, food waste prevention and sustainability”.
One of the main sponsors of this recycled desks was Woolworths Foods. Their head of Responsible Sourcing, Tom McLaughlin, said, “Innovative partnerships that look at different angles of the same overall challenge are key to driving forward the circular economy.”
Fellow sponsors include Amcor, DuPont and FUTURELIFE®.
While the initial batch of desks sent out to schools featured a combination of recycled multimaterial multilayer films, recycled High Density Polyethylene waste and recycled FUTURELIFE® Smart food™ pouches, the scheme wanted to construct desks out of 100% multimaterial waste. This became achievable thanks to the addition of compatibilisers, which have had “a crucial impact” on the project.
“Working with DuPont, we were able to recycle different types of multilayer films together. What makes it special, is the technology that overcomes the time-consuming sorting of the multilayer waste by component. In the past, this represented a significant barrier to cost-effective and efficient recycling. By recycling all multilayers together, we are changing the face of recycling in this area,” says Iqbal Hirji, Founder of RWPA.
As the initial Virtuous Circle pilot comes to close, partners in South Africa are identifying local sponsors to support the continuation of the school feeding and education programmes.