Reverse Logistics Credits semi-finalist of the MIT – Climate CoLab Contest
MIT – Climate CoLab Contest
The goal of Climate CoLab is to harness the collective intelligence of thousands of people from all around the world to create proposals for how to reach global climate change goals. Each year, Climate CoLab invites people to submit proposals for how to address climate change manageable subproblems, in a set of interrelated online contests that we call “contest webs”.
Shifting Attitudes and Behaviours
BVRio’s “Reverse Logistics Credits – an innovative approach to urban waste and recycling” is a semi-finalist in the category “Shifting Attitudes and Behaviours”: What initiatives and strategies can mobilize individuals and societies to shift attitudes & behaviours to address climate change?
The Reverse Logistics Credits model, is an innovative system to facilite the socially inclusive waste collection and recycling solution for urban centers. The system of Reverse Logistics Credits was developed by BVRio to assist companies to meet their obligations under the Brazilian Solid Waste Legislation while rewarding informal waste pickers (catadores) for their role. In order to test the system and demonstrate a proof of concept, BVRio identified industry champions that agreed to pioneer its use and provide leadership in their respective sectors. A pilot project (April 2014 – March 2015) was conducted with two leading consumer goods companies in Brazil: O Boticário in the cosmetics industry and biscuit manufacturer Biscoitos Piraquê. The companies bought Reverse Logistics Credits through the platform over the period of one year, to ‘neutralize’ the impact of the solid waste generated by their products, predominantly different types of plastics and glass.
Results
Reverse Logistics Credits have the potential to become an important tool for meeting the challenges of solid waste collection, screening and recycling. This case study showed that this system provides companies an innovative, efficient and cost-effective social and environmental solution to comply with their legal obligations.The initial results from the trial demonstrated that the cost of this solution is extremely low (US$ 0.00013 – US$ 0.011/unit of packaging). For the catadores, the sale of credits provides an additional source of revenue, adds value to their activities and creates an important social impact. Environmentally, the additional value generated by the sale of credits makes it worthwhile to collect waste materials with lower intrinsic value, widening the range of products collected.
The Reverse Logistics Credit system is ready to be used, and has the potential to provide a socially, economically and environmentally positive approach to waste collection and recycling in the developing world. For this reason we ask BVRio’s followers to vote for us.
More on the Reverse Logistics Credits Model
