Producer responsibility organisation (PRO) the Paper and Packaging PRO Alliance has relaunched an upgraded South African Waste Picker Registration System (SAWPRS), which is the national government-initiated waste picker registration database.

The SAWPRS is integral to ensuring that waste pickers and their informal collection systems are fully integrated into the country’s formal recycling value chain and to substantially expand the collection of recyclables, the PRO Alliance says.

Further, for the first time, PROs will have access to real-time reporting on materials, volumes and payments, which will ease the administrative burden on the organisations through automation and system compliance, the organisation adds.

The initial version of the SAWPRS did not link buyback centre point-of-sale transactions to registered waste pickers, nor enable payment of the associated service fee.

“It has been a long and difficult journey to rectify the technical challenges encountered with the initial version,” says Paper and Packaging PRO Alliance executive director Bhavesh Patel.

The focus in recent weeks has been on training the waste picker organisations, facilitating the SAWPRS registration drives across the country and rebuilding the credibility of the SAWPRS nationally.

From June this year to the end of 2026, the aim is to digitally onboard an estimated 200 buyback centres nationally, thus enabling the payment of the service fee to about 80 000 waste pickers through a cashless, auditable payment system, he says.

The first significant milestone will see 50 buyback centres onboarded by the end of this year and 20 000 waste pickers registered, which will prove the success of the first phase of the project and guarantee funding from the member PROs for the second phase, Patel notes.

“We acknowledge that the technical challenges have disrupted the pace of progress. However, we are confident that, with a fully functioning registration system and the ongoing support of our PRO members, we can accelerate the registration and payment of waste pickers to achieve the ambitious targets we have set ourselves for the next two years,” he adds.

While the SAWPRS did not function, PROs continued with their own projects to drive recycling and pay waste picker service fees, delivering on the requirements of the Extended Producer Responsibility legislation.

A separate but parallel project will ensure that the registrations from these individual programmes are brought into the SAWPRS so that, going forward, there is one auditable source of information on waste picker integration nationwide, Patel says.

Improved collaboration between the various stakeholders, including the waste picker organisations, PROs, government, nongovernment and private entities, along with expert input, access to critical system components and a task team led by the PRO Alliance, enabled the development of the new system in a short space of time, he says.

Further, the Paper and Packaging PRO Alliance is leading the buyback centre 200 project, which is a multi-stakeholder national initiative that aims to accelerate the integration of waste pickers into South Africa’s formal waste economy.

The project uses the newly developed SAWPRS platform to ensure registration on the national database.

Additionally, with the assistance of a transactional platform and a cashless payment solution, the platform will record auditable transactions and enable payment of service fees, says Patel.

Meanwhile, a project team meets weekly to address challenges and maintain focus on the digitisation of the targeted buy-back centres to enable waste picker registrations on the SAWPRS, provide an auditable trace of transactions at buy-back-centre level and enable live service fee payments to waste pickers through a cashless payment solution.

The team also develops plans that will help drive awareness, education and registration of waste pickers, he notes.

To further enhance these efforts and drive waste picker integration, PRO Alliance members and other critical stakeholders also participate in the Waste Picker Integration Working Committee, which considers innovative ways to support waste pickers and to create an inclusive waste economy.

The committee is led by post-consumer metal packaging PRO MetPac-SA CEO Kishan Singh, who has extensive experience in waste management and recycling.