There was an air of tangible excitement, enthusiasm and a strong sense of hope among project role players, beneficiaries, participants and guests at the launch of the Soap for Hope (S4H) programme in South Africa by the Pebbles Project at the Villiera wine farm on Thursday March 7.
The Soap for Hope programme, is a globally run initiative where discarded soap bars from hotels are collected, recycled, and resold by programme beneficiaries and has helped impoverished communities around the world.
Role players, Dow, Diversey- A Solenis company, and Pebbles Project came together to launch a local version of the project in South Africa. The launch of the programme in SA was one of the seven initiatives awarded by Dow within its Business Impact Fund.
Mariette Van Vuuren, sales director South Africa, Diversey -A Solenis Company said: “Soap for Hope is a program that directly engages the local people in helping their own community. At the same time, it helps our hotel customers with diverting tons of solid soap waste to the local landfill.
“This will contribute to a cleaner and healthier environment in South Africa and create shared value for everyone involved-our company, our customers, and our communities.”
Dr Stefan Phang, Global Director, ESG and Creating Shared Value (CSV) Diversey-A Solenis Company said luxury hotels by definition are a very wasteful industry, not by a fault of their own, but because of customer requirements and a lot of this waste created can be turned into treasure for people in need.
“So, if you take this waste convert it into a livelihood programme now the hotels can become captain environment, they are removing tons of waste from landfill, they are giving jobs to people and the end product will now benefit a larger segment of society.
“So you multiply that effect everywhere you go because a hotel in Mumbai generates the same type of waste as a hotel in Nairobi, as a hotel in Bali… So, this is one programme multiplied globally,” he expanded on the inner workings of the programme.
Mr Phang says he launched the first Soap for Hope in 2013 at a hotel in Cumbodia and today it operates in 214 cities across 52 countries.
As to what makes the South African model unique, he credits Dow’s involvement for making the South African project launched at Pebbles a well-equipped and resourced venture.
“This is the first programme I have with a roof; a lot of my work is done in slums. So, it’s not such a nice set-up people are at times sitting on the floor when making soaps because you can tell from the stations, this work can be done from anywhere.”
The Pebbles Project S4H programme is run from their newly set-up production facility on the premises of the Villiera wine farm.
Sophia Warner, Pebbles Project CEO, spoke on how the project will impact the farming communities served by the Pebbles Project.
She praised the project’s three components consisting of job creation, sustainability and promoting improved hygiene practices.
“We have young adults who come through our early adulthood programme who maybe wouldn’t find opportunities out in the big wide world, and here we would have created an opportunity where they are now trained, employed and have a possibility to make money.
“Then the sustainable element with the prevention of recyclable soap going into landfill where we can rather make it into something, and then thirdly with our clinic it makes sense that we are promoting hygiene, handwashing, we see so many cases of children with diarrhoea, gastro, upset tummies, etc., than can be prevented by soap.
“So, it really is an all-round project, but for me having these young adults now gainfully employed is the best part of it.”
There was a visible sense of achievement amongst project participants. One of the newly trained workers at the SH4 facility is Alrico Geduld, 24, from Koopmans Kloof farm.
“I started training here about two months ago because I didn’t have a job. Nothing was difficult, and I quickly grasped all I had to do. The work is nice, we work well together and help one another, it’s a nice feeling to do something good and I already told people that I am selling soap,” he said while proudly showing off the soap he made.
“As a materials science company and supplier of raw materials that serve the cleaning market, Dow is proud to be a key collaborator of Soap For Hope that enables sustainable cleaning solutions whilst helping the local communities,” said Kevin Pillay, Dow’s country leader Southern Africa at the launch.
