THE biodegradable food-packing company Earthbound and telecoms firm Flow have partnered to deliver their first plastic and paper separating garbage bins to the public — all in an effort to promote recycling and, by extension, environmental preservation.

The initiative is the brainchild of Yolande Rattray-Wright, managing director of Earthbound, who said that the delivery of the plastic and paper recycle bins for the public is the start of the second phase of her company’s efforts to keep Jamaica ‘green’.

“Earthbound… started its efforts towards environmental preservation in 2008, with the vision of a three-phase plan,” she told Career & Education at the launch, held at Emancipation Park in Kingston, on Tuesday.

The first phase saw the creation of an environmental documentary called Jamaica’s Environment Off Balance, which was designed to encourage people to ‘go green’.

“Today (September 27), we are launching the second phase… the introduction of public separating garbage bins. There have been efforts in the past to teach about separating garbage with this prototype… I hope this initiative will (extend to) homes eventually where each home has a bin,” said Rattray-Wright.

Four Earthbound/Flow plastic and paper garbage bins have, since the launch, been put in — two at Emancipation Park and the others at Flow’s head office in the capital.

For her efforts, Joan Gordon-Webley, executive director of the National Solid Waste Management Authority (NSWMA), had nothing but high praise for Rattray-Wright.

“Yolande is a lady that I respect. She is a woman of my own heart. She is dynamic. She is a go-getter. And once she latches on, she latches on and she doesn’t let go,” the NSWMA head said.

Gordon-Webley added that the partnership between Earthbound and Flow was especially important given that 61 per cent of the waste that is brought to the landfill operated by the NSWMA should really be recycled or reused.

Denise Williams, director of corporate and government affairs at Flow, said that after Rattray-Wright approached them, it was hard to resist becoming involved.

“We gladly came on board… The idea is to help cultivate a culture of managing our waste and recycling,” she told Career & Education. “We want to get people to start thinking responsibly about how our disposal habits impact on the environment.”

DECS Waste Management will collect, free of cost, the paper and plastic for the first six months of the project.