Innovative StartUp Regenize Seeks To Provide Free Recycling Collection Services
Innovative StartUp Regenize Seeks To Provide Free Recycling Collection Services. Regenize is building a recycling solution for the South African context focused on accessibility, inclusivity, and behaviour change. The company provides residents with a free recycling collection service. The collection of the recyclables are performed by local Recycling Skarellers (Waste Pickers/Reclaimers/Informal Collectors) whom the company partners with.
The company provides the Recycling Skarellers a smartphone to connect them to the households, a uniform, and a recycling tricycle. Add to this the company’s decentralised Local Hubs, it results in increased efficiency, income, and dignity for Recycling Skarellers. After each collection residents get rewarded with Remali, the company’s behaviour change platform. Remali is like Discovery’s Vitality, but for sustainable behaviours, focusing on getting people to reduce, reuse, and recycle. In exchange, residents can use their Remali to purchase vouchers, such as airtime, data, or grocery vouchers. Regenize is also piloting a new model called Simplified Remali which integrates with spaza shops. This will allow residents without access to the internet to utilise their Remali.
The company was co-founded by Chad Robertson, he said, “On a mission to disrupt social norms and discover my superpowers to help make the world a better place.” The name Regenize was created through the combination of three words which describes Regenize. Re – representing reduce, reuse or recycling. Gen – represents generation. Nize – it sounds ‘nize’ so they added it.
Regenize rewards people to recycle because its mission is to get Africa recycling! However, the company doesn’t only reward people to recycle, it also educates the youth through the Regenize Education programmes. Furthermore, it spends time researching and designing new ways it can reuse waste into products that can benefit many.
