The Weekly 'Servicing Delivery' Column: It Makes Rands and Sense to Recycle!

They open an avenue for the intellectually-disabled to use their unique talents and generate an income while making a valuable contribution towards government’s national target of reducing the amount of waste going to landfills in 2022 by 70%. Annually, Oasis saves over 12 000 cubic metres of landfill space!

The Oasis Recycling and Waste Management Project, established in 1992, employ persons with intellectual disabilities to recycle more than 260 tons of waste every month. Each month, 360 workers, who have little prospect of employment, sort waste from 437 businesses weekly and approximately 4000 households drop-off waste every month in Cape Town.

Oasis’ success has initiated additional income-generating streams to supplement their funding. They include two book & bric-a-brac shops and a bakery; a catering unit; and a second hand shop. In 2003 Oasis won a contract to recycle the waste of Old Mutual. 218,319kg of mixed materials was recycled from October 2010 to the end of September 2011 alone.

Although providing an invaluable service to Cape Town, Oasis innovates in aid of the disabled – which remains their core business. The recycling project came about as a response to a lack of funding for the organisation which had been caring for the disabled for 40 years.

Currently it runs two day centres that provide specialized care for 90 children between the ages of two and 18. The four additional Oasis houses around the city provide supervised and secure accommodation to 41 adults.  Every day workers are fetched from around the city and brought to work at the two recycling depots which also provide the services of social workers.

Although these facilities are praise-worthy, the way in which Oasis ensures a stable work environment for the disabled is what garnered them a Gold Impumelelo Award in 2003. Oasis uses recycling to help the self-esteem of the disabled who feel encouraged by being seen to perform a valuable function. This also helps de-stigmatise the perception of the intellectually disabled by the broader community.

Recycling is a “never-ending, recession-proof” work opportunity in addition to the “boring”, “repetitive” tasks being ideally-suited for the intellectually disabled.  Oasis staff laments the Christmas period, when the workers are on holiday and they hire able-bodied casual labour. These workers do not do as a good job. Oasis workers are more precise in sorting waste and their enthusiasm for their job makes for a formidable work ethic.

The Oasis model’s symbiosis between environmental sustainability and support for the disabled is what makes it infinitely replicable. Oasis addresses a key recommendation of the National Environmental Act: it enables diverse parties, particularly the vulnerable, to participate in environmental management; and because waste is not sorted at the source, households, schools and businesses can participate.

The intellectually-disabled can supplement their disability grants. As some Oasis workers are often primary breadwinners, their work elevates their status in their communities. Additionally, their home-based carers have been freed to pursue their own income-sources.  

It is clear. The recycling sector needs the intellectually-disabled as much as the intellectually- disabled needs to help South Africans recycle more!

Read about the creative ways South Africans have pre-empted COP17 from the Impumelelo Social Innovations Centre, the country’s repository for solutions that improve quality of life for the poor.