THE development of a market for waste recycling will help the Philippines achieve its environmental goals by offering rewards for the collection of materials currently deemed unrecyclable, the head of Nestlé Philippines, Inc. said.
The company’s Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Kais Marzouki, said at a virtual forum organized by the Makati Business Club on Thursday that markets are essential, noting that materials that have recycling value routinely get collected and sent in for processing.
“Let the market forces solve the problem… here in the Philippines we have the palengkes (wet markets) that collect (waste materials). Why do palengkes collect plastic bottles? Because the plastic bottles have value. Somebody is happy to buy them back,” he said.
“When it comes to our plastic laminates and flexible plastic, nobody is collecting these because they have no value,” Mr. Marzouki added.
“The moment that you set up an industry that recycles packaging, for sure people will find value and will collect and bring it to the factory to get something in exchange for it and the industry will happily buy also recycled plastic,” Mr. Marzouki said.
He called on the government to lay the groundwork for such markets via legislation and financing to the point where “the whole system can start running on its own.”
Marc Schmidt, a Singapore-based Boston Consulting Group managing director and partner in the firm’s Energy and Industrial Goods practices, said companies can own the origins of the inputs and increase their environmental or societal value, or own the entire production cycle and usage end to end. — Revin Mikhael D. Ochave
