The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) makes a big step in plastic waste management. The President of the DR-Congolese Republic, Félix Tshisekedi has just inaugurated a new plant in the capital Kinshasa, precisely at the 12th street of the council of Limete Kingabwa. The installation was put in service by OK Plast, within the framework of its initiative “Kintoko”. “This plant is the second of its kind in Africa after the one in Nigeria,” explains Medhi Attieh, OK Plast’s general manager.
Plastic bottle recycling plant ©DR-Congolese Ministry of the Environment and Sustainable Development
The recycling unit in Kinshasa has a capacity of 50 tons per day and a stock of 5,000 tons of compacted bottles. The used plastic bottles are recycled into bottle caps, crates for local breweries, chairs, coolers, water pipes, and bottles of various sizes.
A 15 million euro project
Ok Plast collects plastic bottles through containers installed in several corners of Kinshasa. To date, the city has 21 collection points. “For each kilogram of plastic bottles brought in, the collector receives 100 Congolese francs (less than one euro cent),” says the company. The entire project required an investment of 15 million euros. In addition to preserving terrestrial and aquatic biodiversity, the Ok Plast project is a source of employment for many young people in the city of Kinshasa.
The recycling company hopes to increase its operational efficiency in Kinshasa, where the daily production of plastic waste is estimated at 7,000 tons according to a report by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). The next step for OK Plast is to expand its operations to other cities in the DRC. The company can count on the support of the DRC government, with which it signed a partnership agreement on March 9, 2022.
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“We will make the effort so that OK Plast has the electricity which it needs. We will avoid him the hassles in terms of taxes. We will also take care that OK Plast has the exemption for the inputs”, affirmed Ève Bazaiba, the Vice-premier, DR-Congolese Minister of the Environment and Sustainable Development on March 9th, 2022. This facility will run for a period of five years, renewable.
Inès Magoum