A nationwide recycling campaign, the Million+ Plastic Recycling Revolution, has welcomed a collaboration with Pick n Pay School Club that will help educate over 1.7 million primary school learners and over 80 000 teachers about the importance of plastic recycling. Launched by The Polyolefin Responsibility Organisation (Polyco), The Million+ aims to mobilise more than one million South Africans to commit to using plastic responsibly by keeping used packaging out of the environment, out of landfill, and putting it back into the recycling value chain.
With the vision of eradicating plastic waste in our environment and to make recycling the norm for every South African, the Million+ Plastic Recycling Revolution is chasing big targets. “We are thrilled to partner with Pick n Pay School Club in featuring Million+ recycling education material in their school content kit that is distributed to a broad network of schools around South Africa,” says Mandy Naudé, CEO of Polyco. “Children are our future recycling revolutionaries; they will take important messages about recycling learnt at school back home to their families and the greater community.”
By collaborating with Pick n Pay School Club, the Million+ campaign will be placing educational posters into 2,375 primary schools around South Africa to create awareness about the importance of recycling. Together with this educational material, Million+ and Pick n Pay School Club will be launching social media campaigns around World Environment Day in June and during the month of September, which is national recycling month.
“Improving South Africa’s recycling rate requires a fundamental shift in consumer behaviour and the way that people view their used packaging waste. By using powerful platforms like social media, we can create widespread awareness, and help imbed recycling as a culture,” says Naudé.
Recycling is something that every South African should do to end plastic pollution in the environment and to keep it out of landfill. By recycling used plastic packaging waste, we are creating a secondary economy for this valuable material. Recycled plastic re-enters the product value-chain once again to go towards the production of new products.
“It is a great opportunity to partner with Pick n Pay School Club as they have the largest independently produced school materials programme in the country. This partnership will help spread the important messages among learners and create a greater level of awareness around recycling and keeping our environment clean.”
Pick n Pay School Club creates partnerships to share valuable information and lessons with learners. “The educational resources we share with schools aim to support teachers educate learners academically, but we also believe there are valuable lessons to teach outside of the curriculum. The impact of recycling has been a strong focus for our School Club team and we believe the new Million+ material will further drive good recycling habits in schools. Through this partnership, we’ll speak to 1.7 million primary school learners and can help play a role in asking young South Africans to commit to smarter plastic use,” says Andre Nel, head of Sustainability at Pick n Pay.
Anyone can support the Million+ campaign by adding your name at www.millionplusrecyclers.co.za. By signing up as a recycling revolutionary, you are making the simple commitment to recycle all your plastic packaging after use. Do not forget to encourage friends and family to join the revolution.
The Million+ recycling poster and educational booklets are available for download on the Pick n Pay School Club website https://www.schoolclub.co.za/resources/