A Kenyan startup company, Noma Green Plastics Limited, is protecting the environment from plastic pollution by converting the materials into in-demand furniture.
Disposable plastic has been reported to chock the world’s rivers and seas, threatening wildlife, contaminating the food chain and driving the climate crisis.
Noma Green thus gathers nearly 30 tonnes of plastics every month from various dumps, sifts and heats them via moulds using thermo-regulated machinery.
The subsequent product is then creatively transformed into poles, tiles, table beams, and other pieces of outdoor furniture.
Mugo Macharia, Founder of Noma Green Plastic limited, stated that the venture helps locals clean up the environment by tackling landfills that have become an environmental hazard in parts of Nairobi.
In an interview with Africa News, Mugo opined that converting plastics into furniture was economically viable and also saved carpenters from cutting trees for timber.
"We believe that we contribute to the action on climate change in two ways. One is that we clean up the environment. We take the waste plastic from landfills, which aggravate global warming," he stated.
"Our products are very great substitutes for wood. Just look at it this way, one wooden pole is one of our plastic poles. So, the more we use the plastic poles, the more trees we have in our environment and the more we can save our environment from deforestation," he continued.
Mugo founded the business to both clean up the extra plastic thrown into the environment and make creative benches and tables.
"The beauty of plastic is that it's malleable. We can turn it into so many different forms like the outdoor bench I'm seated on, the table that's in front of me that's in progress, and we can partner with anyone who has any form of plastic waste.
"We can take your plastic waste and give it to you in the form you want. Whether it's signboards for your roads or flower pots. It's malleable so we are limited by the extent of the imagination. The more products we can make out of (waste) plastic, the more we save our environment from the plastic menace," Mugo stated.
Additionally, the business produces 100 fence poles per day. The poles are estimated to cost Ksh 900 on average and can last for 40 years.
Since the major dumpsite in Dandora holds nearly 1.8 million tonnes of solid waste against a capacity of 500,000 tonnes with a daily load of 100 trucks from various parts of the city, the treatment of waste in Nairobi has been a contentious problem for decades.
Mugo believes such more initiatives like his can curb the menace.
