Blue economy: “Extended producer responsibility (EPR) into Africa provides untapped investment opportunities in the waste management sector”

Exclusive interview with Janine Osborne, CEO, Sustainable Seas Trust. At the recent AGES in Cape Town, Janine was the moderator of a fireside chat on “Combatting the plastic crisis —Waste management solutions from land to sea.”

Thank you for joining us. Let’s start with some background on you and about the Sustainable Seas Trust.

My name is Janine Osborne, and I’m the CEO of Sustainable Seas Trust or SST for short. And SST is a science-based organisation that works to protect Africa’s seas for the benefit of all those who live on the continent. We do this through research, education, socioeconomic upliftment and collaboration. We work to mitigate the very specific risk of marine litter to a flourishing blue economy for Africa, and we do this through providing detailed resources training support and tailor-made resources for an educational and an awareness campaign perspective across the plastics value chains.

Any specific projects that you are working on that you are particularly excited about?

I don’t know how many of you know this, but Africa is the second most polluted continent in the world, but at the same time, we have the lowest per capita consumption of plastics in the world. And waste, particularly plastic pollution, harms the blue economy in many ways by damaging marine ecosystems, impacting fisheries and reducing tourism potential. These are just a few of the impacts that plastic pollution can have on the blue economy. This is the reason why a proper waste management is crucial for a sustainable blue economy for Africa. With the waste collection rate at only 55%, that’s on average across Africa, we know that municipal solid waste collection services in most African countries is inadequate. So we believe that addressing Africa’s growing waste problem and specific plastic waste problem, while simultaneously unlocking socioeconomic benefits for sustainable waste management, it requires urgent and comprehensive action across the system by governments, businesses and civil society. And therefore, a project that I am particularly excited about is our flagship project called Operation Clean Spot. And it’s gaining traction not only in Gqeberha, where our head office is based, but it’s also being rolled out concurrently in eThekwini in the Durban municipality as well as in the City of Cape Town.

Unlike similar projects that look to address waste and pollution in a certain part of the value chain, Operation Clean Spot addresses waste in a holistic manner. It reaches across the entire plastics value chain and it works to empower local communities to become stewards of our oceans, the very ocean that provides them with food, income opportunities and protects them from the worst impacts of climate change. The waste flow and the economic recycling are being mapped in each of the cities, and this informs the leverage points in the system where SST can intervene. This simple model is something that our partners across Africa and South Africa and their stakeholders are resonating with quite strongly. Our team is hard at work putting the different pieces in place for us to be able to roll out Operation Clean Spot at scale. And this has the ultimate long-term impact of a clean country and continent and zero waste in the seas of Africa. The principle is simple: Wherever you are in the plastics value chain, you take responsibility for waste and litter where you eat, where you live and where you play. And we believe that if everyone is able to take hold and accountability of one spot within their own communities and circles of influence, slowly and systematically, we will be able to clean up not only our cities, but our continent.

Then something else that I’m really excited about are resources that SST has recently published, which are the Plastic Free Seas Guidebook and the African Resource Book series. And I believe these two resources together comprise quite a big step forward in Africa’s transition to a blue economy. The guidebook actually clarifies exactly what actions need to be taken at every step of the plastics value chain and how to address cost cutting issues, things like education and behaviour change and fiscal incentives. All of these things need to be considered. And the guidebook unpacks exactly how these things need to be considered. It also includes plug and play resources in terms of templates to draw up national and regional and city action plans to address plastic waste.

The other resource is called the Plastic Free Seas Resource Book, which is the A to Z of plastic production, the impacts of plastics on our health, safety concerns as well as our environment and socioeconomic considerations. So these are very resource-intensive sources that anyone within the value chain can use to unpack what it means to have plastic in the environment, what impacts it has and how we can actually address it in terms of a holistic systems approach. Together, these two resources will tell you everything you need to know about plastics, plastic waste and how to manage both for a more circular and blue economy for Africa.

Who are your partners?

We work with a number of different partners all around Africa and beyond. Our core funding partner is the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and they have given us generous funding to be able to position SST to meaningfully mitigate the risk of marine pollution to the African blue economy through our various operations and projects.

We are now present in 32 of the 54 African states, and we’ve got communications into all. For our work in these 32 coastal states and the small island developing states, we work

through our multilateral and multinational membership-based organisations: We work closely with the Abidjan Convention states, with the Nairobi Convention states and the Western Indian Ocean Marine Science Association and their member states that are on the east coast of Africa. More recently we have started working with the African states of the Indian Ocean Rim Association. In South Africa itself, we partner with several NGOs and other organisations with a similar vision that we have, which is a future where the people of Africa and her seas flourish together.

What in your view is the biggest danger or challenge that Africa’s blue economy faces due to climate change?

What are the opportunities? Climate change is actually already impacting the blue and the green economy in various ways. We have sea level rises that are causing havoc on the shorelines due to geomorphological processes. Changes in precipitation are causing floods and droughts and unpredictable patterns. We’ve got rising sea temperatures that are starting to change patterns of ecosystem productivity when it comes to fisheries and the fishing stocks that are being impacted.

This in turn will reduce the availability of fish for human consumption. So these are really serious considerations when we’re thinking about the impact of climate change on the blue economy for Africa. If climate change continues unchecked, extreme weather conditions such as storm surges could conceivably combine with normal lunar tides to overwhelm the ability of coastal countries to safeguard their residents, their infrastructure and their futures. Preparing for these outcomes by developing Africa’s blue economy could help to reduce some of the impacts that we are seeing of climate change, while at the same time improving the resilience and adaptation of the continent’s coastal communities.

The blue economy offers significant socioeconomic benefits and opportunities for Africa. This is because of the continent’s vast maritime and aquatic resources. If we want to promote the sustainable use of the ocean, coasts and freshwater ecosystems, we can actually unlock quite serious economic growth, income opportunities and improve livelihoods in the process. There are numerous opportunities available in the blue economy space, such as reducing poverty, economic diversification, job creation, environmental sustainability and social inclusion. But realising these opportunities does require a commitment to sustainable practices, investment in, for example, collection infrastructure if we’re thinking about recycling, capacity building and regional cooperation in terms of sustainable waste management across Africa. And this will then, in turn, allow our resources to be managed wisely and equitably for the benefit of future generations.

What investment opportunities exist for developing and deploying advanced waste management technologies in Africa?
Africa is grappling with rapid urbanisation, increasing waste generation as a result of the urbanisation and inefficient waste management systems. And so, if we are thinking about how to maximise the opportunities in terms of investment that exist for developing waste management in Africa, there are a number of different opportunities. For example, in terms of plastic waste recycling, this is a growing issue within Africa, but it also presents an opportunity to invest in recycling technologies that can convert plastic waste into useful end-use products. We do that quite successfully in South Africa when it comes to PET bottle recycling. PET bottles are what you find your Coke and your sparkling water in. This is actually a widely recycled material in South Africa, and it competes in terms of our recycling rates for PET on par with European and American rates. We have closed the loop in South Africa, and further investment in bottle to bottle recycling is a huge opportunity when it comes to plastic waste recycling. We’ve got a number of different organisations that work to partner with the recycling sector to amplify the impact of plastic recycling. Organisations like Petco, which is a producer responsibility organisation for PET plastic. And they have been completely foundational to driving not only the value chain for PET plastic in South Africa, but the recycling system that exists for PET plastic bottles.

Source images: SST

So there are a lot of opportunities for investment in terms of plastic waste recycling. I would also say this goes hand in hand with opportunities for material recovery facilities or MRFs. And these opportunities are really around setting up state-of-the-art MRFs that can handle mixed waste streams and efficiently recover valuable materials for reuse. The thing about recycling is that if you put nonsense in, you’ll get nonsense out: The higher the quality of the feedstock, the better the quality end-use material that you’ll get at the end of it. Material recovery facilities allow us to have high-quality feedstock that goes into the recycling process and therefore high-quality end-use products that can be produced from that.

The other opportunity is really around product design for recycling. The thing about recycling is you have to keep a constant balance between the collection infrastructure for recycling and waste collection, the actual reprocessing of the materials to get the main value out of the feedstock and the end use product that gets pulled out. Without one of these three components, recycling is not feasible. So that’s something that a lot of people don’t understand: The economics of recycling are incredibly important when you’re thinking about sustainable waste management. Therefore, product design for recycling allows the product to be completely compatible to the recycling infrastructure that is available in your area and it allows for a high-quality end use product to be created from that material. I think businesses, private sector and government can do a lot of innovation and lot of investment in terms of product design for recycling to ensure that the products that are placed on our market are recyclable and recycled into new end use products.

And then the last opportunity for investment I would say that comes to mind is around extended producer responsibility (EPR). These kind of programmes require manufacturers to take responsibility for the life cycle of their products, including the collection, recycling as well as disposal. And so companies that provide the necessary infrastructure and services to support EPR initiatives have a growing market, not just in South Africa, but into Africa. In South Africa, for example, mandatory EPR has been in effect for the last two years. And there are requirements that are legislated for increased content containing recycled materials.

This is a really innovative and interesting way to drive the kind of behaviour that you want to see for positive recycling behaviour as well as for increased sustainable waste management. So I think extended producer responsibility into Africa is an untapped opportunity for investment.

How can partnerships between the private and public sectors be enhanced to address pollution more effectively?
Partnerships are critical for addressing any wicked problem, and pollution and litter, these are wicked problems. So the partnerships between the private and the public sectors are critical in addressing pollution in particular because they bring together the strengths of both of these players, right? The government support, the policy making in regulatory frameworks alongside private sector innovation, investment and operational expertise. So some examples of how we can enhance these partnerships would be around collaborative monitoring systems. If we have a partnership in governments, NGOs like SST and private sector, we can share data on pollution sources, environmental quality and pollution levels. In this way, we will be able to best understand where to intervene and how to maximise the potential and efficiency and efficacy of those interventions.

Other opportunities for partnership would include things like capacity building and awareness raising as well as training. Organisations like SST often provide resources for training that are freely available and governments and the private sector are able to take those resources and take their own resources, mostly in terms of investment and financial support and roll it out on a scale that the NGOs may not be able to attain on their own. So those kinds of partnerships are really important for being able to unlock intellectual capacity and opportunity, which is often held within the SSTs of the world, and then scale that can be brought in by the private sector investment and partnership.

Regional pollution control and management is really important. We know that pollution doesn’t actually respect country boundaries. And especially when we’re talking about ocean pollution, it definitely doesn’t respect country boundaries. So this makes pollution that ends up in our oceans a regional problem. And that means that there need to be regional interventions that are put in place to manage waste and littering.

When we’re talking about a regional approach, it requires different countries to speak to each other, like through the multilateral organisations that I mentioned earlier, the Abidjan Convention and the Nairobi Convention, to be able to address this wicked problem in partnership. So those are just some examples of how partnerships between the private and the public sector can actually address pollution more effectively.

How important is green entrepreneurship on the continent in your view?
I think green entrepreneurship just in general is really important if we’re talking about addressing pollution and offering both innovative solutions and economic opportunities, especially in Africa, because we have an incredibly active informal sector that operates within the waste management and the recycling sector. It’s estimated that between 60% and 70 % of that which is recycled in South Africa by weight is collected by the informal sector. So they are a really, really important partner and leverage point within the sector, and understanding how to integrate the informal sector appropriately in a way that makes sense to them is foundational to a just transition in Africa.

Image source: SST

So green entrepreneurs are critical for establishing systems to collect and recycle and reuse materials, not just in South Africa, but in Africa at large, and moving away from the traditional linear take, make and dispose model. They can tap into the potential of upcycling, transforming old products and materials into higher value items and can further appropriately formalise and professionalise informal waste collection and recycling services. And in that way, we’d be able to offer better pay, better working conditions and more sustainable practices across the value chain. So in my view, green entrepreneurship is a vital tool for addressing plastic pollution and litter and waste in Africa. By fostering innovation, creating jobs, promoting sustainable practices, green entrepreneurs can help to tackle some of the content’s most pressing environmental challenges.

You moderated a fireside chat at AGES this year on combatting the plastic crisis and waste management solutions from land to sea. What were your impressions of the event?
I think the Africa’s Green Economy Summit or AGES was very well attended from what I could see, and this really demonstrates the growing recognition of the importance of sustainable development and investment in the future of Africa. I also think the event emphasised the need for a more collaborative approach across different sectors, because we are tackling a wicked problem like environmental challenges and a sustainable blue economy. And through this collaboration, we can foster innovative ideas, we can attract investment in green technologies in South Africa. But if we are operating in silos and not having the conversation, then these innovative approaches cannot be unlocked. These type of events like Africa’s Green Economy Summit allow for the opportunity to have those conversations in a structured, well-facilitated manner. I think it’s incredibly important, especially in this day and age where geopolitical landscapes are shifting all the time, we need to be discussing these things at that level of international collaboration, international partnership and international investment.

How important is such an event for the continent?
I think events like Africa’s Green Economy Summit really play a pivotal role in driving the continent’s transition towards a sustainable blue and green economy. Not only do these kind of summits offer a platform for collaboration and discussion, but they also work to address key challenges and opportunities that are associated to the green and the blue economy. And really, the Africa’s Green Economy Summit highlighted for me the urgent need for increased investments in green initiatives across Africa for the promotion of sustainable economic growth, for the mitigation of environmental risks and just really to ensure that Africa takes a leading role and a leading voice in the global action against climate. I think it’s imperative for us to continue having these kind of summits, continue having these kind of discussions, and to continue to collaborate to unlock new and innovative approaches to dealing with climate action at a global level.