Goodbye Plastics
In early July I wrote about the need to say goodbye to plastics.
I quoted the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) which revealed that as of July, only 16.55% or just 662 of around 4,000 enterprises registered with the DTI had submitted to the National Solid Waste Management Commission their programs for the proper management of their plastic wastes. These include plastic bags, sachets, labels, laminates, and both rigid and flexible plastic used for such products.
While it is good to see that quite a number of companies have responded to the call for sustainability in terms of changing their business model to address natural resource consumption, raw material selection, product packaging design, we certainly want more companies and organization to join the sustainability movement and help the country win the war against plastics.
Today I would like to highlight companies and organizations that have recently taken the plastic issue seriously, trying to be ahead of competition:
•Palawan towns set records in a national bottle recycling program. The effort was carried out across 21 barangays, raising more than 240,000 bottles. The bottles are turned over to Ginebra San Miguel Inc.’s BOTEful program (GSMI). The program encourages barangays to retrieve empty bottles, helping to keep glass waste out of landfills, waterways and coastal areas. Used glass bottles can only be reused or recycled when they are properly collected and returned instead of discarded as waste.
•Nestle Philippines, Robinsons Supermarket, and Restore Solutions PH are piloting a retail-based sachet recovery system. The initiative aims to establish a collection and recycling system for sachets, which are among the most widely used, but difficult-to-recycle, forms of plastic packaging in the Philippines.
•The Energy Regulatory Commission ERC) set the ceiling price for electricity generated waste-to-energy (WTE) projects.
•Residents in Malabon earned cash after exchanging recyclable plastic bottles and other waste during a city-led recycling collection drive.
•The Department of Finance (DOF) is proposing a P150-per-kilogram excise tax on single-used plastics.
•Century Pacific Food Inc. (CNPF) recovered the equivalent of 8 billion sachets worth of plastic waste, preventing this garbage from leaking into the environment. Plastic waste is collected across various communities and channeled back into the economy through recycling and conversion of waste to energy.
•The Cebu Chamber of Commerce and Industry’s Flood Hero Cebu Movement collects used PET bottles across partner schools. Every plastic bottle dropped into the receptacle is given a second purpose.
•The Department of Science and Technology and the Philippine Textile Research Institute (DOST-PTRI) have launched ONWARD: introducing natural fiber-based alternatives to synthetic plastics across a wide range of applications. Non-woven textiles are widely used in-everyday products such as face masks, wipes, automotive interiors, footwear components, filtration systems, medical supplies and construction materials.
The future of sustainability – as can be seen by the above examples – is not driven by regulation alone. It may not be driven by activism, investor pressure, or corporate commitments alone. The real catalyst may be something much simpler. Sustainability gains momentum when companies discover that doing the right thing also happens to be good for business. In contrast, if companies do not focus on sustainability, they will fall behind!
Let me conclude with the wise words of Dr. Ron F. Jabal, the CEO of the PAGEONE Group:
•What once appeared to be waste becomes fuel.
•What once seemed to have no value becomes an asset.
•What began as an environmental solution becomes an economic opportunity.
I look forward to seeing more organizations following those as listed above.
As I said in a previous column: make sustainability a purpose of business and society. And politics, please create attractive policies that will strengthen these initiatives.
Let me have your reactions; contact me at [email protected]
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