The Munch on the Move recycling project was conceptualized by Jemima and Gabriel Reilly and has been adopted and developed by the non-profit organization the Sustainable Seas Trust (SST). Munch is a large wire-work coelacanth fish and a recycling deposit that is moved around schools to help collect and sort waste at source before it ends up in the ocean. The fish wirework is divided into five waste components: plastic caps, PET bottles, paper, HDPE plastic items and aluminium cans.
Jemima said they wanted to raise awareness about plastic pollution after they saw a video about a turtle that had a straw lodged in its nose. “We wanted to get Munch because there’s a lot of rubbish on the beach that we don’t want the fish to eat,” said the 8year old from Port Elizabeth.
28 February 2020,Mfesane SecondaryOn School in Motherwell became the first school in Nelson Mandela Bay to take part in the Munch-on-the-Move training programme and adopt Munch for a month. The aim of the programme is to measurably reduce plastic pollution on school grounds around Africa.Nozi Mbongwa, SST Education Head says the aim of the programme is to reduce plastic pollution on school grounds around Africa.
The SST’s education team trained the teachers, the school’s governing body and the children from the environmental club at Mfesane Secondary School on how to conduct litter audits within the school’s grounds and how to use Munch. Later on this year, SST will be rolling out the programme at two other schools in Port Elizabeth and two schools in Gauteng.
According to Patricia Mapuma, Mfesane Teacher and Environment Club Co-ordinator “Munch is being used together with various support aids as the key tool to get the children excited about recycling. The environmental club pupils are always seeking opportunities to reduce the waste within our school, and this is going to be a fun project for them to champion “.
