A model to help reclaimers and communities work together
RANDPARK – The African Reclaimers Organisation hopes residents can help by actively using the separation at source model.
While it may still take some time for government and reclaimers (waste recyclers) to formulate a concrete plan to work together and benefit, African Reclaimers Organisation hopes residents can help by actively using the separation at source model.
Dr Melanie Samson of the Wits University Department of Human Geography said, “What is key is that we need to recognise reclaimers as skilled workers who need better access to their materials. These are materials that we as residents easily throw away in large amounts. be Statistics that we have on municipal recycling are meaningless as no one monitors the amount of work that reclaimers do.
“Reclaimers have to sleep in parks and the streets of suburban areas so that they can wake up early enough to beat the garbage trucks. This is a time where the community labels them as vagrants or suspicious people when all they are trying to do is make a living.”
Both Samson and the organisation suggested that the best way to help with this problem was the separation at source model, but where residents separate for reclaimers instead of private companies.
Separation at source refers to the practice of setting aside household waste materials at the point of generation to prevent them from entering the waste stream that is destined for landfill.
Samson said, ““If people could understand their issues and if their work could be formalised and paid for.”
“The government is paying companies who have no interest in recyclables with your rates and taxes to remove garbage as well as recycling centres who turn a profit. No money is being provided to reclaimers who collect over 80 per cent of recycled materials in the country.”
The organisation’s research in the inner-city showed that in areas where reclaiming had been privatised, income for individual reclaimers went down by a third.
The organisation’s Luyanda Hlatshwayo said, “The problem started when the City decided to give private contractors the right to materials and closing landfills. In 2013, you could make between R600 to R800 per week as a reclaimer. After that, it went down to around R200 per week. Separation at source is for us the simplest way of moving out of the current system.”
He added that the average reclaimer collected about 200kg of materials and travelled about 7km per day.
“Sometimes people say that we make too much money. Well, it takes 23 two-litre bottles to make one kilogram, which is only about R3.50. For me to make R500, I have to collect bottles for three weeks.”
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