What is the narrative beneath recycling, on the scale of society and on an individual scale?
In certain systems, such as this one, waste management, there needs to be more transparency.
Ionuț Georgescu, General Director FEPRA International SA:
We are in a field of increased complexity of life, and waste management, inevitably, enhances this complexity. Let’s see: Do we have seven types of plastic? What should I do? Split plastic waste in seven types, in seven separate containers? And you are telling me that paper is being divided in two types, the printed one, that has ink, and the simple wrapper one, that doesn’t? Should I also split paper into two separate containers? And how many containers do they all take up? My head hurts already! And it is only natural for any one to have a headache when one perceives the immense complexity towards which consumption is taking us. That aside the fact that, anyway, human life is very complex. And we have to sit half an hour to sort the waste we are producing? It is normal for us to perceive it as hard. From my point of view, the solution is based on two main directions: technology development and education. I mean the necessity of developing the technology of waste management. And I am talking about the necessity of enhancing the degree of trust, namely increasing transparency. In certain systems, such as this one, of waste management, there needs to be more transparency. If we had the possibility, for example, to find out, with a single click in a smartphone app, from those who have picked up the trash, that the waste has reached recycling and then we’d see in the shops that a bottle there is a label which tells us it was obtaining through recycling or that it is a reused bottle, then our trust would increase. There would be a position emotion being created that would determine us to be content with our actions and our effort regarding waste, but also with our consumption from that point.