Earth Today | Eliminating single-use plastics, one event at a time

With the scheduled launch of their operations set for October this year, Zero Waste Jamaica is intent on making its own mark on the elimination of single-use plastics on the island – one entertainment event a time.

“I am naturally an environment enthusiast. After relocating to Kingston from St Ann, it became very apparent the waste crisis we are facing in Jamaica. I recalled growing up in the countryside and my grandparents would basically reuse every container and food scraps the household would produce,” said founder and chief executive officer (CEO) Kemar Allen, in explaining his decision to register the company in 2017.

“It then came to me that there is a huge gap, and conversely an opportunity within Jamaica’s waste management industry. I, therefore, set out to pursue and implement convenient, practical and environmentally friendly means of tackling our current waste management systems on the island,” he added.

The St Ann native noted that he had seen at first hand the sheer volume of plastic cups and straws needed to maintain the flow of beverage at a single event, and that he is determined to address it.

“This is based on results from my event ‘St Ann Carnival’, which saw patronage of over 2,000 persons and the use of over 10,000 single-use cups in basically a six-hour event. So whether the event is a festival, concert, 5k walk/run, sports event, etc., we will remove the single-use plastics from that event,” Allen said.

It is against this background that the CEO, with the support of chief operations officer Sasha Gay Brown, has set about giving life to Zero Waste Jamaica, with technical input from the Branson Centre for Entrepreneurship. Now after years of planning, they are applying the finishing touches to go to market.

“Presently, what is getting much attention is the Event Waste Reduction aspect of our business. We are focused on offering recyclable waste removal services and implementing systems with existing events operation to prevent them from producing certain categories of waste. This section of the company focuses on removing single-use plastics from event operations,” Allen said.

“What we do is replace the widely used single-use plastic cups and straws with reusable, sustainable and environmentally friendly mugs and straws. Therefore, every patron that enters a particular event receives a branded reusable mug,” he added.

“Once an event organiser agrees to adopt our concept into their operations, this immediately eradicates the burden of purchasing thousands of single-use plastic cups and straws, as well as we also take away the burden of event organisers having to employ the services of a waste management company,” Allen said further.

CURRENT BAN

Zero Waste’s offerings come even as Jamaica takes actions at the national level to arrest the scourge of plastics pollution on the island, as seen elsewhere in the world.

For example, the island has instituted a ban on not only single-use plastic bags, but also packaging made wholly or in part of expanded polystyrene foam or drinking straws made wholly or in part of polyethylene or polypropylene, manufactured for single use.

It became effective on January 1 this year, making it illegal for any person “to manufacture or use any single-use plastic in commercial quantities”, according to the Natural Resources Conservation Authority (Plastic Packaging Materials Prohibition) Order 2018.

Also as at January 1 last year, “no person shall import or distribute any single-use plastic in commercial quantities”, according to the Trade (Plastic Packaging Materials Prohibition) Order 2018.

To go against either order is to risk conviction and a fine not exceeding $50,000 or imprisonment of up to two years in the case of the Natural Resources Conservation Authority Order, and a fine of up to $2 million or up to two years behind bars in the case of the Trade Order.

A further ban came into effect this year, with restrictions on Styrofoam products.

Jamaica’s efforts come even as 2.5 billion metric tons of solid waste are produced globally, some 275 million metric tons of that plastics. At the same time, as noted by Professor Mona Webber of The University of the West Indies Centre for Marine Sciences, “two billion people within 30 miles of the coast create 100 million metric tons of plastic waste every year; eight million tons of plastic goes into the ocean and by 2050, there will be more plastic in the ocean than fish”.

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