Durban siblings make an impact with recycling initiative
Besides having a massive impact on the environment, the plastic
they have collected helped them get a wheelchair for their uncle.
It’s always inspiring to see young kids do good and Durban-based siblings, 15-year-old Banele Machi and her 13-year-old brother Wandile, are making an impact with their exciting new recycling initiative to keep the province clean.
The sibling duo from Amaoti, in Inanda near Durban, have
embarked on mission to keep their poverty-stricken area, about 30km north west
of Durban, clean by collecting plastic, paper, glass and plastic bottles, bread
tags, and two-litre bottle lids in a new recycling drive.
The initiative came about after the siblings learned
about the impact of recycling from their mother Bongi Machi. Bongi is a
domestic worker who was encouraged to take on the idea by her employer in Glen
Ashley.
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Bongi says that her employer provides the teens with plastic bags which they use to collect plastic around the area which can simply be dropped in recycling bins. The siblings then take the glass, paper, tins, and other items they collect and send it on to projects such as the Bread Tags for Wheelchairs project.
Bread tags are made of high impact polystyrene and can be used to bring in enough money to buy a wheelchair. However, the road is long as one bread bag will hold 1kg of tags, and it takes 200kg of tags to bring in enough money to buy one wheelchair.
However, the organisation’s hard work has certainly paid off for the family as the teens’ uncle, who had a stroke, has now been given a wheelchair as a beneficiary of the charity.
The teens’ father, Lucky Machi, says that the teens have been taking their recycling efforts seriously over the past few months and often go out and clean various areas of their community after school. “I think it’s a good thing that they are doing,” Lucky says. “It is better to live in a clean environment, but often around here people just throw their rubbish away on the street. We stay near the river, and plastics are bad for the water and the fish. Also my children’s efforts help to stop too much plastic getting into the sea.”
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Banele and Wandile add that they also make ecobricks by stuffing fine plastic into two-litre bottles which are then used in river booms. These help trap plastics floating down rivers from getting into the ocean.
“They don’t seem to get this sort of information at school. That is a gap,” Lucky adds. “They need to understand the consequences of plastic and other pollution and what can be done about it. Everyone can help.”
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