A fresh start
More and more Kiwi businesses are getting on board with sustainability, writes Sarah Catherall, and in the most innovative, inspiring ways.
Annie Fischer unrolls a billboard across a warehouse floor. Donated by the Royal New Zealand Ballet, the faces of stars in the ballet production Giselle slowly emerge, as Body Shop volunteers slice into the fabric on a Friday afternoon. In time, this billboard will be given a new life, repurposed as bags that will do good in a couple of ways – reducing the size of our landfill, and raising money to help children in Burma and Thailand via Wellington-based charity, Spinning Top.
These eco Defender Bags are part of a rising tide of products being made out of plastic, paper and other types of waste here in New Zealand. According to the Ākina Foundation, an organisation which grows social enterprises in New Zealand, conscious consumers are increasingly seeking sustainable products made out of waste, while more people are willing to take action to turn rubbish into new, useful things.
Established businesses are getting in on the action too – Garage Project is turning post-brew spent mash into dog treats; Wishbone Design Studio has made a children’s bike out of recycled residential carpet turned into resin; and DB Breweries is repurposing bottle waste into beer bottle sand that can be used in construction projects, such as mixed with asphalt for new roads in the Waikato.
It’s a move away from the take-make-waste linear model that has ruled for decades, to what is officially termed a “circular economy’’ – a concept being promoted by the Sustainable Business Network (SBN, which recently launched a Circular Economy Accelerator Programme and sponsors annual Going Circular awards).
“As pressure on resources grows, we need to shift to a more circular economy – where the life cycles of materials will be maximised, optimised, and continued indefinitely through continuous reuse,’’ says James Griffin, SBN’s project lead.
Back at the warehouse, Fischer, co-manager of Spinning Top, says a growing number of companies are donating old billboards as word spreads, while Spinning Top is also sourcing directly from billboard companies. “These billboards would normally end up in landfill. But the plastic bag message has finally sunk in. People like to buy something that minimises waste too,’’ she says.
One study* estimates that transitioning to the circular model of production and consumption will unleash $1 trillion worth of new businesses into the global economy. *Study by McKinsey & Co
Sales for the shopping, laptop and beauty Defender bags have taken off in the past year, which Fischer attributes to the rising backlash against waste and plastic. So far, their efforts have generated $35,000 for the charity – that money has gone to help a couple of specific projects, including one that aims to keep kids in schools, and another to fight child trafficking.
Repurposing is also the buzzword with Andrew and Justin Lambie’s business Subs jandals. Recycled from plastic collected from ocean clean ups and recycling plants, to date the pair has removed more than 42,500 kilograms of plastic from beaches in New Zealand and parts of Asia, backing organisations such as Sustainable Coastlines.
Growing up on a farm on the edge of the ocean near Pendarve in Canterbury, the brothers were disturbed by the dead fish and sharks they saw in nylon nets, along with plastic bottles bobbing in the waves.