Earlier this year Tswane Mayor Stevens Mokgalapha announced that informal recyclers also known as reclaimers who operated by the side of the road in Pretoria, would be moved to more formal place where they could conduct their business without harming the environment.
Fast forward to a couple of months, Johannesburg citizens were introduced to Recycling with Reclaimers. The project brings residents and reclaimers together to protect the environment, increasing reclaimers’ incomes, improve their working conditions, and provide reclaimers with job security. It also promotes the formation of a healthy relationship between the two parties instead of residents recycling through private companies.
The initiative partners residents of Brixton and Auckland Park with African Reclaimers Organization (ARO) and Unilever. Sophia Welz, a member of the Brixton Community Forum, said the aim of the pilot project was to develop an implementable model that other areas could use in the future. Welz invited reclaimers from ARO to a Brixton park clean up and since then they have been looking for new ways to collaborate.
“It was a really successful meeting. I think everyone left there knowing a bit more and we hope that the reclaimers felt valued because that’s one of our main things, we value the work that they do,” said Welz.
According to Luyanda Hlatshwayo, a reclaimer with ARO, residents will be given a clear plastic bag to put their recyclables materials in. On the day before the usual municipal collection, 50 Reclaimers dressed in green uniforms and carrying ID cards will collect the bags and give the residents a new recycling bag for the following week. The bag of recyclable material will be weighed and reclaimers will be paid a top-up fee of 50c per kilogram over and above what they receive for the recyclable materials when they take them to one of the city’s buy-back centres.
Melanie Samson, a researcher at Wits who works with reclaimers said they do not get paid a service fee for their work and are often in competition with private waste companies that have more resources.
Experts estimate that Reclaimers collect and recycle up to 90 percent of South Africa’s post-consumer packaging and paper. In doing so, they save local governments up to 750 million rand, or nearly $53 million, in waste storage space every year. Eli Kodisang, the chairperson of ARO, said Unilever had agreed to sponsor the pilot project, including a service fee for reclaimers. He said the service fee of 50c per kilogram was a balance between making it worthwhile for the reclaimers and still making it financially viable for the city should it decide to implement the model.
Kodisang said the aim was to get the city to use some of the money that reclaimers saved it to pay the reclaimers a service fee which would help stabilise the income for reclaimers because the prices of materials often fluctuate depending on the time of the year.“ They are saving the municipalities a lot of money but the city would rather pay private companies to do the work that reclaimers do,” said Kodisang.
According to Professor Rinie Schenck who is based in University of the Western Cape “informal waste pickers recycle 90% of the recyclables collected from households in South Africa. This possibly saves municipalities up to R750m in landfill space every year. “Some municipalities ban all waste pickers while others try to accommodate them”.
“For example, the city decided to hire these private companies which forced reclaimers to start sleeping in parks because they needed to beat the trucks to get access to the recyclable materials,” said Kodisang. The current system was not benefiting anyone because reclaimers end up sleeping in parks, the recycling companies do not get the materials, and the city ends up spending money on companies that do not provide the service, he said.
