With many South Africans working from home, the lockdown is an opportune time for households to set up recycling systems and; for those with children, to involve them, especially from a young age, comments plastic rotational moulding solutions provider Pioneer Plastics.

Recycling services for the recycling of glass, paper, plastic, metal and tyres, as well as some other materials, such as batteries and lightbulbs, have been allowed to resume operations since early May.

Pioneers explains that recycling is when household waste is sorted by material, such as glass, plastic, and metal, which a recycling company then collects and converts into new usable materials.

“This should not be a complicated process. The trick is to keep it simple and make it fun and not a chore for children. The way to do this is to create a system that is convenient, yet effective and that the entire family can easily participate in,” it notes.

This starts with the location of one’s recycling system, which needs to be easily accessible by everyone, including small children.

A kitchen, a laundry room or even the garage is ideal – but only if the location is easy to access.

Households will also need to decide on which recycling service provider to engage, as some collect all of a household’s recycling in one bag and separate it for you, while others require the different materials to be separated by households.

A good way to decide this is the space one can allocate to recycling containers. If a person only has a small space that will only fit one bin, then they should opt for the first option, where all the materials to be recycled are placed in one container.

However, if one has more space, then they are encouraged to opt for a system that has different dedicated bins for each materials, and to sort these materials upfront.

“Despite the country’s recycling sector always doing well, currently in South Africa most recyclables come from landfills and informal recyclers. More households need to sort their waste – whether between recyclables and nonrecyclables or even further between recyclable materials – to make a significant impact,” Pioneer states.