Circular Action Hub, Tetra Pak launch recycling pilot in Vietnam

Brazil-based Circular Action Hub has partnered with Switzerland-based Tetra Pak and Packaging Recycling Organisation Vietnam (PRO Vietnam) to develop a carton recycling initiative and pilot project in Vietnam to try to increase recycling rates and provide income to waste pickers in the country.

According to a news release from Circular Action, the pilot project will take place in Vietnam’s Ho Chi Minh City until March 2023. Through the pilot project, recycling activities will be run with the cooperation of beverage and food manufacturers involved in the PRO Vietnam alliance while carton collection will be managed and monitored through Circular Action’s KOLEKT app.

Circular Action says this project follows on a feasibility study BVRio conducted for Tetra Pak in 2020 that evaluated strategies for the collection and recycling of used beverage cartons in Vietnam and India. That study found that informal waste pickers are crucial to carton collection programs. With the KOLEKT app, developed with waste pickers in Indonesia, Circular Action designed the Circular Action Program (CAP) to manage the recovery and recycling of 3,000 metric tons of used beverage cartons in Ho Chi Minh City.

CAP is a customized service based on engaging all actors in the waste supply chain and providing incentives for collection, sorting and recycling of all materials. According to Circular Action, the system is managed using supply chain traceability and monitoring tools—the KOLEKT app and reporting platforms—for the program to register all who are participating in the waste management supply chains to enable traceability.

Circular Action says the program will start by paying larger waste collection centers an incentive fee for all Tetra Pak cartons sold to Dong Tien Paper to be recycled into brown paper, chipboard or corrugated roofing. Large collection centers or waste aggregators receiving a performance-based payment per kilogram sold will pass on this bonus to waste pickers in order to secure the supply.

Additionally, to deliver social and environmental benefits, PRO Vietnam is providing incentives to aggregators and recyclers to process the cartons collected through the program, which is a benefit passed onto waste pickers through the higher prices paid for collected materials.

“We appreciate the initiative, the model and the effectiveness of the collection for recycling of used beverage carton projects from Tetra Pak, one of our core members,” says Pham Phu Ngoc Trai, chairman of PRO Vietnam.

The project is being overseen by John Murphy, project manager for the Circular Action team in Vietnam, as well as Circular Action Director Thierry Sanders.

“This project has the potential to be transformational for all involved,” Sanders says. “This project brings a triple-dividend of firstly preventing waste going to landfills or nature; then it increases the incomes of waste pickers and finally creates cooperation throughout the supply chain. Tetra Pak is the perfect partner willing to pilot this innovative way of working, involving mobile technology. PRO Vietnam now has the method to grow waste collection across Vietnam for the decades to come.”