Four micro-entrepreneurs – including Tajuddin – were identified in Bengaluru, Delhi, Kochi, and Pandhurna, and provided with the financial and managerial support to formalise their businesses and ensure clean, safe, and economically sound working conditions for those in their supply chains.
These workers, in turn, helped maximise the recovery of low-value plastics including flexible films and packaging, diverting them from landfills and water bodies, and towards co-processing in cement kilns or recyclers.
The four micro-entrepreneurs were further provided with training in bookkeeping, on health and safety, and labour laws, as well as responsible waste management practices to ensure that they would be able to maintain compliance, and that they properly understood the benefits of an ethical business model.
At the end of Phase 1, some 3,793 tonnes of primarily low-value plastic waste had been diverted from the environment and valorised.
Three of the four entrepreneurs that made significant progress on social inclusion during the first phase are being engaged in the second phase of Let’s Transform. In this phase, which kicked off in May this year, the project team is helping the micro-entrepreneurs to add value to the sourced waste, and divert a portion of it towards recycling. They are also being taught to use the digital traceability tool, TRACER, designed to track the end-to-end movement of the plastic waste, providing both transparency and access to data. The programme will be completed in November 2023.