Plastic Bank & Henkel Egypt celebrate collecting 300 Mn plastic bottles in less than 2 years

By Eman Hamed

Plastic Bank celebrated, yesterday, the collection of more than 300 million plastic bottles in Egypt, preventing them from reaching the river and seas. This new milestone comes as part of its strategic partnership with Henkel Egypt. The event was held at the house of the Canadian Ambassador to Egypt, H.E. Mr. Louis Dumas, and in the presence of Amr El-Kady, Regional Director for Egypt, Middle East & Africa at Plastic Bank; and Carol Milan, General Manager at Henkel Egypt.

Plastic Bank has formulated a comprehensive strategy that aims at creating an ecosystem for collecting plastic waste and improving waste collectors’ living conditions. Moreover, it plans to promote plastic waste exports in Egypt, which contribute to the national economy; offering a source of foreign currency, job opportunities, and a competitive advantage.
Under its strategic partnership with Henkel Egypt, Plastic Bank introduced a comprehensive ecosystem for the first time in Egypt to support the circular economy. As a social enterprise, it aims to reduce plastic waste and improve the living conditions of low-income families through establishing plastic waste collection centers. These centers will enable the process of collecting, sorting, and recycling plastic waste. Then, the recycled materials will be used as raw materials in the manufacture of other products. Thus, this process will maximize the use of natural resources in order to limit plastic waste and resource inputs, contributing to reducing carbon emissions and environmental pollution.
On this occasion, Canadian Ambassador to Egypt, H.E Mr. Louis Dumas, said: “Today, as we mark Plastic Bank’s milestone of stopping 300 million plastic bottles from being dumped into both the Mediterranean and Red Sea, we also pause to reflect on how they managed to make people see the value in plastic and envision a better tomorrow. As we get ready to head to COP27 next week, this milestone serves as a reminder there is a dire need for cross-sectoral approaches to tackle climate change by establishing robust ecosystems, and a circular economy, for the good of healthy biodiversity and people. With today’s success story and positive outlook, I am confident to say that Canadian CleanTech Plastic Bank plays a vital role in countering the growing eco-anxiety that exists in our world today – we need to remain hopeful and stubbornly optimistic.”
Meanwhile, Mr. Amr El-Kady, Regional Director for Egypt, Middle East & Africa at Plastic Bank expressed his appreciation for the efforts of the Canadian Ambassador to Egypt H.E. Louis Dumas, towards the environmental and plastic pollution issues, claiming: “The partnership between Plastic Bank and Henkel Egypt is novel in its own and aims at providing a solution to reduce plastic waste, and addressing the social challenges related to poverty and lack of job opportunities as well. Today, we celebrate the collection of 300 million plastic bottles through this successful partnership, which supports sustainable development as a whole.”
“In 2021, we launched 3 plastic waste collection centers in Mansheyyet Nasser – Cairo, in collaboration with Henkel Egypt. These 3 centers were the first step of establishing a large number of plastic waste collection centers throughout Egypt. We succeeded in expanding in 14 communities by operating in 4 new governorates and adding 20 other centers, making the total number of centers operating under the highest standards to reach 23 centers, wherein 7,058 tons of plastic waste were collected by 1688 waste collectors registered in the system,” El-Kady added.
“Plastic Bank constantly conducts market researches in Egypt to efficiently serve the beneficiaries through localized solutions that are consistent with Egypt’s infrastructure, culture and logistical requirements. Therefore, now we have 3 different electronic platforms to digitally disburse the fixed incentive, in addition to issuing new medical discount cards within the incentive package offered to cover up to 70% of medical expenses. We have also helped all collection centers and waste collectors to obtain the necessary legal papers such as commercial registration, tax card and identification cards before joining our system, in addition to providing school supplies to more than 350 children of collectors as part of our efforts to support their education.” El-Kady stated.
In this context, Carol Milan, General Manager at Henkel Egypt, said “It’s a pleasure for us to attend this ceremony hosted by the Canadian Ambassador to Egypt to celebrate the great success achieved by Plastic Bank. Through the fruitful cooperation between Henkel Egypt and Plastic Bank, we aim to achieve our strategic vision and well-established concept of sustainability, which entails raising environmental awareness, economic empowerment, as well as women empowerment and inclusion, given that preserving the environment and raising the standard of living for low-income families are integral to Henkel Egypt’s activity, which eventually helps support Egypt’s 2030 Vision toward a successful circular economy.”
She went on to add, “Today, we celebrate, along with Plastic Bank, a crucial milestone in our partnership, in addition to reaching 23 plastic waste collection centers, as well as enhancing the living standards of more than 8,440 plastic waste collectors and their families. Our partnership succeeded in empowering the economically-disadvantaged groups by integrating the informal plastic waste collection sector and transforming it into an official one that is not only limited to plastic waste collection across Egypt only but also helps people maintain a stable income and improve the living conditions of the needy plastic waste collectors. This comes in addition to supporting and empowering women, who represent 14.3% of the plastic waste collectors enlisted under Plastic Bank.”
Egypt’s government is keen to support the efforts of both the private sector and other social institutions that aim to limit the aggravating plastic waste problem, promote sustainable practices, and maximize the role of the circular economy. Thanks to this approach, many successful partnerships have been formed to combat this problem, on top of which is the collaboration between Henkel Egypt and Plastic Bank in support of the efforts made by the government, which highly focuses on protecting the environment, evidenced by hosting the COP27 in Sharm El Sheikh this November.”