Oh, hi there. Thank you so much for checking in to learn more about our latest developments. April was a month full of surprises, immense joy, and some minor challenges.
As you know, we’ve identified five main target groups to work with in Capurganá: tourists, residents, hotels, restaurants and shops, as well as adolescents/kids. While March heavily focused on educating and involving adolescents and tourists it was now time to start engaging the remaining groups.
Residents. Over the course of April we visited a total of 200 households to introduce Plasticaware. Since the majority of people were unaware of the existing recycling system of the state of Colombia the conversations revolved largely around that and the importance of fighting against plastic pollution. We provided practical tips on how to reuse recyclables and introduced the concept of “eco-botella” (a plastic bottle which is filled with small plastic packages).
In the beginning the plastic heroes were a bit shy but after a few visits, they started to feel very confident and did an exceptional job. The feedback from the community was incredible. Many were eager to learn more and were thankful that we devote our time and resources to heal mother earth. Our efforts have not gone unnoticed which lead to incredibly interesting conversations and fruitful discussions, also about how we, as an organization, can improve our processes in the future.
Hotels. Capurgana is a tourist destination with a lot of hotels. It, therefore, comes as no surprise that we worked closely with the local hoteliers to create a booklet defining guidelines and responsibilities. It is extremely important for the success of our project that they act as role models and become Plasticaware ambassadors.
Restaurant & Shops. During the last week of April we focused on visiting restaurant and shop owners. Similar to the conversations with hoteliers, we decided to highlight what impact their day-to-day actions have on the environment and what their roles and responsibilities in the plastic recycling and waste management process are. Inspired by our mission, some have already taken it upon themselves to improve the current recycling standards on the island. This includes, for example, collecting plastic bottles in separate waste containers outside of their restaurants. The general awareness has risen and they have pledged to be more environmentally conscious.
In other news, we also continued our efforts at the local recycling station. During last month’s assessment, we came to the conclusion that the system needed to be more user-friendly for it to work. This month we put that idea into practice: we helped clean the space, put order into the system, and coordinate the drop off of recyclable materials. The fact that the amount of waste collected has increased since our presence in Capurgana has made us tremendously happy and is a clear sign that our investments are bearing fruit. This intense reorganization process and close collaboration with the head of the recycling company has also revealed where the true weaknesses lie and what the best areas for improvements are. So we promptly decided to adjust our initial plans: instead of providing the company with an extrusion machine, we equipped them with better work utensils for more efficiency and less injuries.
Simultaneously, Plasticaware’s environmental engineer, acted as a consultant for the recycling company by optimizing the garbage collection routes and creating documents on how to better deal with the garbage problem, especially, the open garbage dump.
Lastly, we also started working closely with the foundation “Ecopazifico”. This great foundation came to Capurgana to install four recycling containers. The foundation is very well known in Colombia and their help was a great addition to our work. We learned a lot from their experience and also profited from their network. The plastic heroes were super committed and motivated to take on extra work. They helped during an Ecopazifico beach-clean-up, where they were collecting Mapare to design an “art wall” out of plastic, and defined critical areas in Capurgana and challenged themselves to clear the space within 3 days. They did an incredible job proving that we have already left a mark.
That’s all for now. Talk soon 🙂
