The Problem

Many cities in developing countries such as Gulu, Uganda are plastic waste sinks--plastic comes in but never gets out because there is no recycling option. Since Gulu is a 6 hour drive from the nearest recycling plant, the high transportation costs make it economically unfeasible to send low-value plastic waste for recycling. So the plastic in Gulu is burned, buried, or littered.

Discarded plastic soda and water bottles are littered across streets and fields because the polyethylene terephthalate (PET) bottles have very low recycling value. No industries in Uganda can use recycled PET flakes since its chemical properties make PET very difficult to process. Since China and other Southeast Asian countries have stopped plastic waste imports, Ugandan government officials say they are “really stuck and desperate” because they have no solution for PET waste.