eRECICLAJE
Country: Colombia
Organization: eRECICLAJE
2) Sector of activity: Education Environment and Social Care
3) Description of your products or services: Information, education and tools for better recycling and less garbage. The primary clients are street recyclers and the users of the garbage collection service. I provide the necessary information and contacts the recycler needs to efficiently recover waste materials from households generating direct income for the recycling service instead of the grabage collection service. The tools provided for correct in sourde separation of materials, bins and sacs, are provided by the same recycling industry which collects them as waste from industrial processes. Colombian society is divided in 6 levels depending on income and is reflected in public services rates. The highest level 6, pays in Medellın, $38.000 pesos per month for garbage collection. With the introduction of a recycling strategy people earn the right to be chraged only for the amount collected. Only with industrial recyclable materials being drawn out of the garbage, people start paying only $8.000 pesos/month. This depends on the waste reduction level it reaches. The savings of $30.000 are divided equally for the user and for the recycling company eRECICLAJE. 40% of what is received from every household is given directly to the recycler as income. This also gives the advantage of recovering more valuable material, which people voluntarilly separate and send to be recycled; opposed to the former way of digging into the garbage and selecting dirty material to be recycled.
4) Description of the operational model: www.ereciclaje.com is the web site where is information on how to separate waste from recycling. It tells the benefits of doing this and provides techniques and tools for doing it. When a client wants to recycle, we visit and see if there is a street recycler already digging in the garbage recovering what he could sell for survival. I tell the recycler if he wants to work with us and receive the 40% of what we collect from the savings we generate to the customer. If there is no recycler we search the zone for one that can do the job or we go to cooperatives and make the offering. Recycling is usually transported in human powered vehicles very long and steep distances. Medellın is called Capital of the Mountain. By allowing recyclers to do the job inside the deposits of buildings and residential units, they can store bigger amounts of recycling making the trip more worthy or even hiring other transport method. It is very innovative that people are sending very clean recycling so the job of separating and packing can be done in a safe and efficient way. And also people know when and where to recycle, as what amounts of garbage and recycling are being produced historically.
5) Description of the financial model: People only receive benefits with our services and products. The initial activities of diagnostic, setting up containers for separating materials, and education, are paid in advance but the money is recovered by the customer with the savings they will later receive. Also the containers are set up so they produce an amount of sorted and packed materials that can be sold. In a second phase we plan to start collecting organic matter or waste, this will generate bigger savings for customers and income for recyclers. As well as a source of a raw material highly valued in agricultural processes. We expect to open AGRO- ecological parks, by the hand of the municipality, with the use of biodigestors, composting, organic gardening and permaculture design to take advantage of this material we have free access to. If not with the municipality, we expect to coninue growing as we have, so that our own income can lead us to buy land and transport, to build the park with our own resources. Even it is possible to get a credit from a bank, although we prefer to keep our balances positive.
Client fees represent this approximate percentage of operational budget: 99%
6) Key operational partnership: In year 2002 a law "Decreto 1713" establisehd that people had the right to be charged for garbage collection only the amount generated and not a standard fee, if they fullfilled some requirements. In Medellın this service is provided by EEVV. This means that they will receive less money if people recycles. Being a public agency the interest is not to generate revenue but to provide better waste disposal and less garbage. We have been asking from them to grant us this rate reduction for our customers but at the same time showing how people are producing less garbage and more recycling in the statistics page every customer has. Other very important partner is the industry. PLASTIC, PAPER, GLASS and METAL. They all receive better and more continuos prime matter. Through www.ereciclaje.com is the opportunitty to show technology for investors to know and invest in this industry. We are also showing that the money people pays for garbage can end up in a better place than in a water and soil contaminating landfill: in the hands of a big troop of recyclers better than in a few air polluting garbage trucks.
7) Current outreach:
We are at the Scaling Up stage. We have been working with communities for two years. We started with our families, and soon new customers called and wanted to receive the service. Actually we administer 2000 households. This are grouped in 20 residential units (condos). 4 have received the benefit of the rate reduction 2 had contract for only one year. Other 5 are ready to receive the benefit, and the rest are learning to recycle before we ask for the reduction. We plan to set up a model for areas where people do not live in condos. There are several projects with different communities that plan to create a waste reduction system with environmental and economical benefits. One case is the overpopulated Island Islote, where the plan is to acquire a sailboat, to transport waste inland, and as a financial support it can transport people and merchandise back to the island.
How many clients have benefited from your product/service in total? Over the last year? Customers who recycle, 2000. Recyclers who no longer dig in the trash and sell better naterial and receive income for their service, 3. Partners who get better materials to put back in the industrial chain: 7
What percentage of your clients is below the poverty line ($2 per day)? 50% Recyclers in Colombia are very far away from the poverty
line. Usually are very hard working people who come to the
cities without anything and no land to cultivate. They see
the opportunity to recover materials in garbage and sell
them for very low prices as the only chance to survive.
Customers who are garbage producers for the recyclers are
wealthy people who pay the top rates in public services.
And another fraction are normal communities with no extra
money to spent, and that any savings in public services
would greatly benefit their quality of life.
What is the order of magnitude of the potential demand for your products or services? Which
other low-income groups, countries or regions could benefit from it? Try to quantify (number
of clients, market size in currency):
This is a huuuuge business. I get offers from industries in oher countryes willing to buy huge amounts of plastic, or aluminum, or tetrapack. It is a product never ending because we all consume and discard things every day. In Colombia there is a population of 225.000 recyclers. 40.000.000 people live, mostly in urban areas. In medellın 4 million people. 2000 level 6 condos, 30 households average, $15.000pesos/month income for eRECICLAJE per household=$900.000.000/month, 40% for the recyclers. Bogotı is three times bigger and rates are higher. There are other 20 cities with good markets, and many many small towns. The situation is alike for all south america, where Colobmia is ahead thanks to Decreto 1713, and recycling culture has awaken.
8) Scale-up strategy:
How many low-income individuals do you plan to benefit in three years from now? How are you planning to scale up or replicate your solution? What are the major constraints to scale up?
For my own safety I plan to have at least one ecopark and a population of 10.000 house holds, with at least 20 members or clients for the system and work force. I receive many emails and calls from students and entrepeneurs who would like to start a recyclnig system in their community. With this people and having solved a financial structyyure in the base here in Medellın, where there is a staff already committed to the continuity of the operation I can help open new bases that connect to the global statistic and know how much garbage is being effectivley reduced, and who, how and where is happening with it. The major constraint is to leave home. Once you have established in one place you feel safe in it, but that also gives you the safeness yo can go back.
Which specific areas - and why - in your field would benefit most from investment by corporations, foundations, and other investors:
Health assurance: The income of people is basically spent in food and clothing and health only comes in an urgent case or pregnancy which people are not prepared to pay. Investment would give a safe margin so that people coould do their job knowing its health has been taken care of. Investigation: Proving new technologies and products need proofs that necesarily will not produce income. Also reaching a big public demands a delivery structure that is very expensive. Advertisement: Not only to sell the product and service, but to teach people how to use it, and generate better results.
9) The organization: How does the initiative fit with your overall organization's strategic goals and priorities? How did the initiative start?
I do not understand the question. But it all started as an idea for a university homework my sister had. We came up with the idea of an information service that would help recylers know when, where and what to pick up, and people when, where and what to recycle. Since then I started doing a business plan, and getting involved in everything I could about recycling, even more than of business administration.
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10) On the mosaic diagram, which of these factors is the primary focus of your work?
- Factor: High volume business based on small (even tiny) in
- Principle: Leverage the power of communities as both consumer
Contact Information:
Name: Felipe Guerra Vılez - C.E.O.
Organization: eRECICLAJE
Mailing address: Calle 45 No 58 - 27, 2 piso Sagrado Corazın, Medellin
Country: Colombia
Email: ereciclaje@ereciclaje.com
Tel: 5124974
Fax: 5124974
Website: www.ereciclaje.com
Organization's legal status: Legal
Number of Employees: 4
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