In the beginning of 2018, I travelled with the Henkel team to Haiti for the grand opening of three new plastic waste collection centers supported by Schwarzkopf’s Million Chances initiative and Henkel’s Laundry & Home Care business. These Social Plastic® collection centers are part of a partnership between Henkel and The Plastic Bank which was established in 2017. They are operated by The Plastic Bank and will collect thousands of kilos of plastic per year, serving hundreds of collectors. The centers offer cash or goods ranging from phone charging to cooking fuel in exchange for plastic garbage.
Viewpoint
“We must turn off the faucet and continue to monetize waste, so it’s never discarded”
According to the World Bank, one out of four Haitians (2.5 million) earns less than US $1.23 a day, making Haiti the poorest country in the Americas. This is just one reason why Henkel decided to partner with The Plastic Bank in Haiti where there is great potential for impact. Within three years, The Plastic Bank:
- has established 35 Social Plastic® collection centers with
- 2,000 collectors who have
- retrieved 8 million pounds of plastic waste, which is the
- equivalent to 144 million plastic bottles kept out of the ocean, and
- turned them into Social Plastic® for reuse by corporations.
For many Haitian families, daily survival precludes any concern about the environment. Discarded plastic piles up in streets and gutters, and eventually flows into rivers and the ocean. As I stood with the Henkel team on the beaches of Haiti, we were struck by seeing the devastation that is occurring with plastic on the beach.
There will be more plastic than fish in the oceans by 2050 if we continue business as usual. It is killing our marine wildlife and contaminating our seafood. We must turn off the faucet and continue to monetize waste, so it’s never discarded.
To do this, The Plastic Bank is expanding into Brazil, Ethiopia, and Philippines, and soon to Indonesia and India. We invite corporations to purchase the Social Plastic® or purchase plastic offset. The increased value of Social Plastic® benefits the collectors. With about 10% of the world population living on less than $1.90 a day, there is still much work to do to reduce global poverty.
The Plastic Bank is creating a supply chain of social material that can be used for good throughout the world. But it’s our private partnership with Henkel to create abundance together that we’re most excited about because it is a good example of what can be achieved by joining forces.
As a result of our partnership, thousands of kilos of plastic will be extracted from the environment. The price increase for Social Plastic® will be passed on to those most vulnerable: Haitian mothers will benefit most including their children who can go to school or see a doctor.
We know that the shared experience of working together in Haiti will further our bond as we all steward the earth, its ocean and its people.
