Our team keeps growing!

We’ve just hired our first two employees at our sorting station on Bangka Island. One of the biggest benefits of achieving official NGO status is that we’re able to enter into employment contracts in Indonesia. This means we can build out our team and contribute to the local economy whilst ensuring that our workers are treated fairly. Through our partnerships with resort partners Murex, Sea Souls, Blue Bay and Coral Eye, we can fund the employment of two locals to help process the waste that is collected via our waste management programme.

Currently, we have one island based sorting station on Bangka. Here, plastic from across the island collected through beach clean ups is sorted according to material type, bagged up, weighed and recorded using Cleanhub’s app. We collect waste from our partner resorts every fortnight and the team will also record this pre-sorted waste at our sorting station. This constant flow of trash needed two enthusiastic and dedicated team members to manage. And so we hired Eby and Rini!

Meet the team

Rini

Rini was one of the “three angels” who studied with us during the lockdown and got involved with the beach clean ups we ran in partnership with Coral Eye. Rini received dive training during this time and this exposure to the underwater world inspired a passion for the environment. Keen to pursue a university education, Rini will work with us full time for a year to allow her to save for her studies in the future. She’s hoping to study Business Management at UNSRAT in Manado next year and hopefully she’ll pick up some useful skills with us that she can apply to her future endeavours. Having learned English in school, Rini coordinates our collection service with our resort partners and is super proactive in cleaning the beaches and reefs.

Eby

We’ve been working with Eby for some time in a voluntary capacity. With a young son, Eby needed a flexible contract and so will work for us on a part-time basis so that she can balance child care needs. Eby lives right next to our sorting station so this is the perfect role for her as she can see the benefits of keeping the beaches clean right on her own front door step. Eby has watched the sorting station grow and develop from the very beginning, as her husband has worked for Coral Eye, one of our partner resorts for a number of years now. We know that Eby will take her passion for the environment home with her and pass it on to the next generation through her enthusiastic son.

Rini and Eby have already done some phenomenal work processing many kilos of waste. We can’t wait to see the impact they’ll continue to have, not only in terms of plastic sorted and processed but also on their communities. Rini has already organised beach clean ups with her friends, spreading the word about how important it is to look after our environment. Providing stable employment opportunities within the local community demonstrates that there is economic value in waste management. We hope that by demonstrating this circular economic model, more people will be inspired to support our mission! A big thank you to all the resorts that have made this possible!