Turn wastepaper into money

Don’t throw away or burn those old newspapers, magazines or even those heaps of paper in your waste basket. Why not sell them instead to companies which buy wastepaper and recycle them into new paper products?

In doing so, you are not only helping the country’s economic and social services managers, you can also earn a little extra money.

There are a lot of buyers of wastepaper like used bond paper and old carton boxes. You can even sell directly to companies that recycle these waste materials into new paper products.

One such company is Trust International Paper Corp. (TIPCO) which operates a paper mill in Mabalacat, Pampanga. TIPCO buys wastepaper by the truckloads and turns them into high quality paper. But the local market can hardly supply the needs of TIPCO and other companies which have similar operations. According to TIPCO, the rate of wastepaper recovery in the Philippines is only 26 percent, the lowest among Asian nations, with Korea ranked first.

Because of the dearth of local wastepaper, TIPCO and other recyclers have to import 90 percent of their raw materials consisisting of newsprints, ledgers (white bond paper and the like), brown carton boxes and mixed wastes (colored paper, six-month old newsprints and carton boxes).

TIPCO buys white paper at P6.50 per kilo and others at P3.50 per kilo. The sock may be picked up by the company but the volume must be at least three tons.

TIPCO exports 50 percent of its output and sells the other half in the local market.

Aside from making a little extra money, selling wastepaper is also a means of helping the government in its effort to manage waste. On Jan. 26 last year, President Arroyo signed into law Republic Act 9003, otherwise known as Ecological Solid Waste Management Act, which provides for the systematic administration of all waste management activities that do not harm the environment.