The reason that we launched @BambuuBrush® was to make positive social change in the developing world and to combat plastic pollution. We have given a lot of thought to what we want to achieve through our company’s charitable giving and how our ambitions can be realised. We want to be a part of the action and part of the solution - to set up the projects that we help to fund and ensure that we are creating the most impact. We don’t want a standard corporate social responsibility policy. It’s simply not us.
We donate 10% of profits from the sale of each of our Purposeful Products to Humanitas Charity, spearheading our collective ambition to bring about effective humanitarian change alongside environmental action. Humanitas offers homes, education and healthcare to some of the world’s most vulnerable children, and we are working with them to expand their work to protect the natural environment in the communities where these children live.
This year we plan to pilot a social enterprise project, Plastic Swap Shop 1.0, in Ayensuako, Ghana – the location of the Humanitas school that we visited in 2020. It’s a very simple idea, but the potential for it to be replicated in communities living in poverty around the world is huge.
Our first aim is to install a plastic re-moulding machine in Ayensuako. The villagers will collect plastic and hand it in to our recycling facility in exchange for household products. The machine will make bowls, water containers and building bricks that will positively impact the quality of people’s lives in the community. The collectors can keep or sell and earn extra income for their families creating a localised currency for plastic.
The higher-grade plastic will be bundled and sold to larger recycling facilities and the money raised will be reinvested into the social enterprise programme and the Humanitas School. Once it’s up and running, we plan to use it as a blueprint to support other communities living in poverty around the world.
We are so excited to lead this project and we are aiming to raise £45,000 to kick start the social enterprise in Ayensuako. If you would like to find out more about our plans, please contact tommie@humanitascharity.org or donate here today www.humanitascharity.org
Current Stage:
Plastic Swap Shop has been launched* partnering with Humanitas Charity to bring together knowledge and resources from an Environmental and Humanitarian angle. Humanitas Charity have schools based in Rural Ghana and Romania. *Public launch October 1st
BamBam - Our bricking making machine is at low-tech stage producing compressed plastic bricks from a variety of plastics that have already been trialed, tested and used in India to build homes in local communities. We will start working with The University of Herts alongside retired space engineer's who produced the machine to introduce some technology to heat the plastics to form a consistent, standardised brick.
