Our work aims at
maximising impact.
Disposable diaper collections for cleaner, healthier communities.
In townships, disposable diapers discarded in open areas are a significant health risk, often due to underserved municipal waste collection. Diapers are also disposed of
in toilets, which cause blockages.
In 2023, Kimberly-Clark, makers of leading brand Huggies, contracted GreenEdge to design and pilot a separation-at-source diaper collection service in Langa, Cape Town.
The project team partnered with 12 Early Childhood Development centres and 160 of their parent customers. During the 16-week test period, over five tons (more than 20 000 diapers) were collected. These were transported out of the township for safe disposal at a sanitary landfill.
The pilot showed that with local partnerships and convenient collection methods, significant amounts of used diapers can be collected and responsibly disposed of. The result is cleaner neighbourhoods and healthier communities.
Partnering with Cape Town’s pioneering ‘Think Twice’ recycling programme
The City of Cape Town began piloting kerbside
separation-at-source collection pilots in 2008, to divert
recyclable household waste away from landfill and into the
circular economy.
GreenEdge researched best-practice communication and behaviour change methodologies from around the world to design how these could suit the local context. We then partnered in the roll-out with the municipality’s recycling contractors in campaigns to help householders make separation-at-source at home part of their weekly routine.
Convenience is key to behaviour change, so householders received free clear bags into which they gathered plastic, glass, paper and tins. These are put out for collection weekly on the same day as refuse. The mixed recyclables are all taken to the City’s materials recovery facility to be sorted into different material types and sold back into the recycling industry.
Over the years the service has expanded to include over 120 000 households, making it one of the most successful municipal recycling programmes in the country.
Implementing Saldanha Bay’s award-winning at-source programme.
The Saldanha Bay municipality includes holiday and retirement resorts as well as farming, fishing and industrial enterprises. In 2016, GreenEdge was sub-contracted to introduce separation-at-source recycling collection services to residents.
Free clear bags for recyclable materials and weekly collections were provided for householders. We ran a recycling art competition in schools and produced videos for school learners, residents and municipal staff about municipal recycling and waste management services.
The steady progress of residents’ participation in separation- at-source recycling was reported back regularly in the local community newspaper and the municipality’s social media.
In 2018, the municipality won an Eco-Logic national award for the programme. By 2023, residents had diverted nearly 7,500 tons of waste from going into landfill. The value generated from savings in landfill airspace is estimated at more than R2million.
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