2023 In Review: A Year Of Collaboration
The past 12 months have been an incredibly busy but productive year for the No-Trash Triangle Initiative. Our mission to protect the Coral Triangle, the most biodiverse marine environment on the planet, continues. Much of the progress that’s been made is down to the support of our network of partners who each play a role in the circular economic model we’ve created. As it comes to the end of the year, we’re taking a moment to celebrate some of our 2023 highlights and thank some of the partners that have made our success possible.
Signing up new resort partners
We now have a grand total of 10 resort partners across North Sulawesi. We started off with Coral Eye, Blue Bay Divers, Murex and Sea Souls on Bangka Island and quickly expanded to Gangga Island Resort and Spa, Siladen Resort and Spa, Celebes Divers, Nomad Divers, Oasis Bunaken Resort and 3Will Resort. Our resort partners are a vital part of the circular economic model we’re creating, with the income we receive for waste collection services supporting community engagement and education programmes.
Creating local employment opportunities
This year, we have created five permanent positions across our operation. Having opened our second Ocean Plastic Sorting Station in Manado, we employed an extra two employees as well as expanding our team on Bangka Island to three. With our ever expanding network of resort partners and new collaborations with local government on waste management, we’re collecting more plastic than ever. This expanded team are passionate about ocean conservation, and are dedicated to processing this ever increasing flow of waste in the right way, recycling as much as we can through careful management and sorting.
Taking to the sea on the No-Trash Triangle boat
Members of the ViewToo team, an Italian marketing agency, visited our operation on Bangka Island earlier this year and decided to support our efforts by sponsoring our very own trash collection boat. This has meant that in 2023, we’ve been able to cut hire boat costs as well as growing our team on Bangka to include a boat driver who manages waste collection from our resort partners and collects waste from remote beaches around the island. We also received funding from ADTO as part of their Environmental prize, in collaboration with Blue Bay Divers, for a new boat engine, further boosting our collection efforts.
Continuing to protect the ocean from plastic pollution
This year, we’ve started collecting waste from a number of river barriers in Manado, in collaboration with DSG. This plastic waste, combined with the plastic collected from our resort partners and the local community totals 70 tonnes across 2023. We estimate that roughly 20% of this is recyclable with the majority of the rest of it being sent to a co-processing facility in Java, reducing carbon emissions and earning us plastic credits through our ongoing collaborations with CleanHub and Oceanworks.
Educating the next generation
We’ve relaunched and expanded our education programme! We revisited Lihunu Middle School earlier this year with support from Sea Soldier and then expanded to Kahuku in recent months on a standalone basis. We’ve received funding from another international partner, Raffeisen Capital Management, to support this expansion. Having the opportunity to educate local kids about the importance of the incredible marine environment surrounding them is some of the most important work we do - creating the next generation of ocean ambassadors.
It’s been a year of incredible successes and collaborations. None of what we’ve done would be possible without the support of our network of partners. We would like to extend our heartfelt thanks to all who have contributed to our efforts to protect the ocean from plastic pollution and look forward to working together into 2024.
