She spent her whole life in a town with high rates of unemployment and a drug problem among youth, and it’s always been a dream of Johanna Leshabane’s to be able to help her community in a positive way.
But her dream took a huge knock two years ago, when she was retrenched from her job as a store manager at a retail outlet in her hometown of Ermelo, in Mpumalanga.
Leshabane found herself among the thousands of other residents who were unemployed.
“It was an extremely difficult time for me. I had nowhere near enough capital to start my own business.
“Ninety-five percent of our youth don’t have matric, and they are using drugs and are not working. And lots of them do not have both parents, and are living with their grandmothers or grandfathers. It was difficult when I lost my job too. It was like staring down the barrel.”
Despite this Leshabane was determined to chase her dream of positively impacting her community.
So she scraped together all the money she had saved up and bought an old bakkie with the idea of starting her own buy-back waste company.
The plan was to collect waste from households, schools, companies,and illegal dumping sites.
Then, she launched Bophelo recycling with the aim of creating employment as well as cleaning up the environment in her beloved hometown.
Today Bophelo Recycling has transformed into an award-winning business, and Leshabane has managed to create employment for several people in her community.
Most recently, Bophelo Recycling received national acclaim for improving the lives and livelihoods of Ermelo community members while making a positive difference to the environment.
Today, Bophelo Recycling has six full-time staff members and 11 registered waste pickers. The waste buy-back centre collects 36 tonnes of recyclable PET plastic from informal settlements, households and schools in the Ermelo area. This equates to a 79% increase in total collection volumes since inception.
Polymer producer Safripol and the national industry body for PET recycling (PETCO) have together also provided Leshabane with supporting recycling infrastructure worth R500,000.
The joint contribution included, among other things, a shipping container, electricity supply, trailer, roofing structure, trolleys, signage, fencing and branding, as well as training and mentoring support.
The support has helped stimulate job creation, economic growth and development in the area.
Her recent national achievement, in the form of the Responsible Care Initiative Award in the Corporate Social Responsibility category, came from the Chemical and Allied Industries Association (CAIA).
It recognises the impact the project has made on improving the lives and livelihoods of Ermelo community members while making a positive difference to the environment.
Leshabane says the recognition has been a dream come true.
“I feel so blessed and very honoured,” said Leshabane, who attributed her success to PETCO, Safripol, her staff, and the community members, schools and companies which allowed Bophelo to collect their waste.
“I couldn’t have done it without all these people,” she said.
Speaking about her business, Leshabane described it as a buy back centre.
“We collect waste from households , schools, companies, and illegal dumping sites. We also collect waste in town and we buy waste from the communities and rural areas.
“We deal with plastic bottles(PET),paper, glass bottles, K4 ( cardbox) white paper, plastic, cans and other valuable waste material.”
She says she was inspired to start a waste company after seeing how people in her community threw away valuable waste.
“I used to see how people burned the waste, and illegal dumping sites continued to grow in our community. Most of the people in my community didn’t have much knowledge about recycling or how to re-use their waste material , so I saw it as the perfect opportunity to do something about it.”
Leshabane’s business has grown from strength to strength. She started off with just three part-time employees.
“It's a great achievement to help somebody put food on their table and change their lives.”
She says the key to her success has been hard work.
“It's hard work, determination and perseverance. We are working together with our local Municipality, Department of Environmental Affairs and Agriculture, and our Sponsors Petco AND Safripol.”
She adds that she is delighted that her business has helped create employment and at the same time helped clean up the environment.
“I am so grateful that more jobs will be created and our environment will be clean.”
Leshabane says she also loves her job very much.
“I do love my job more than I loved working in retail. I love helping underprivileged people, my community, and being able to change their lives and also help educate them about recycling. I am teaching them that somebody’s trash is my bread .”
She says her family are also super proud of her achievements.
“I am the first person in my family to have a business and achieve what I have. I have also inspired my friends and family to work hard and chase their dreams too.”
Despite the business being negatively affected by Covid-19, Leshabane says she planned to grow Bophelo even more in 2021.
“I’d like to branch out into another town so that we can create jobs in other rural settlements and teach more people how they can start their own recycling business.”
Avashnee Chetty, Safripol sustainability manager, said the project demonstrated that “real change is possible in the lives of the most vulnerable when it is driven at grassroots level, and when community members are engaged as both partners and leaders”.
“This project is embedded in the local community, and it is only through joint partnerships of this kind that real impact and sustainable social change can be achieved. Safripol is extremely proud to be associated with this project,” Chetty said.
Petco collections and training project manager Belinda Booker says the training and mentorship of waste pickers was “critical to improving their working conditions and that of their surrounding communities, while simultaneously keeping our environment clean.
“The PET recycling sector has an important role to play in contributing to the transformation of the South African economy. Few issues are more important,” says Booker.