On Friday the 7th of June several representatives from some 85 schools who recycle with Wildlands Conservation Trust, gathered at Russell High School in Pietermaritzburg to be recognised for their contribution to a green economy, at the ‘Wildlands Recycling Schools Awards evening’. Hosted by the Wildlands Conservation Trust, CEO Dr Andrew Venter addressed the individuals that led the collection of over 714 000 kg’s by learners from schools in and around Pietermaritzburg in 2012.
“What you have achieved is phenomenal,” said Venter. “The value of the recyclable waste that our recycling schools collected in 2012 is over R500 000 and of this, almost half will be given as a rebate to the schools involved (as a thank you from Wildlands), for you to hopefully invest in other worthy “green” projects.”
Third prize was awarded to St Johns DSG who collected 34 992kg’s, second prize went to Epworth High for their collection of 35 456kg’s of recyclable waste and first prize (by a long stretch) went to Deccan Road Primary for their collection of a super impressive 63 478kg’s of recycling.
Deccan Road Primary Principal, Siva Gounden, was handed their prize by Miss Earth Semi-finalist Julia Gramkow and this included a cheque for R18 908 (the schools rebate value), a R200 shopping voucher sponsored by LCM Engineering, goodies from Wedgewood, stationary from Waltons and five Karkloof Canopy Tours vouchers.
When asked what their secret was, the Principal of Deccan Road said, “We find the motivation behind our recycling project starts at home. We even have children as little as Grade 1 recycling – it needs to become something that is entrenched in everyday living,” said Gounden.
There was also a fun element to the awards evening in that attendees were asked to dress up or accessorize with recyclable waste. The best dressed prize was given to Eastwood primary school who sent their school representative in a recyclable gown with a recyclable (pink) handbag that was quite frankly too fabulous for words!
Wildlands’ School Recycling initiative would not be possible without key partners. One of these partners is ‘Hulamin’. Hulamin is one of the leading manufacturing businesses in South African and has carved out a niche in the global aluminium rolled products market. Hulamin recently contributed 50 recycling bins to the top 50 Wildlands’ recycling schools to ultimately nurture and drive Aluminium foil recycling.
“This has allowed for further expansion of our recycling model which is always exciting for both us and the schools that are so actively involved,” said Urvashi Haridass, who is in charge of the recycling setup at Wildlands. “Without the support of partners like Hulamin and DEA Green Fund it would be very difficult to maintain this operation and we are grateful for the current partners and are always looking for other potential donors,” concluded Haridass.
WILDTRUST (registered as the Wildlands Conservation Trust - IT No: 4329/1991/PMB)