Nzambi Matee got tired of waiting for a solution to all the plastic waste she saw, so she created a company to deal with it. The material engineer opened a factory in Kenya where they turn plastics which can’t be recycled (with traditional methods) into bricks. She designed a concoction of hard plastics and sand to create a solid brick which has a comparable price to stone bricks. This is a neat solution to a global problem, her one factory has processed 20 tones of plastics since 2017!
“Our product is almost five to seven times stronger than concrete,†said Matee, the founder of Nairobi-based Gjenge Makers, which transforms plastic waste into durable building materials.
“There is that waste they cannot process anymore; they cannot recycle. That is what we get,†Matee said, strolling past sacks of plastic waste.
Matee gets the waste from packaging factories for free, although she pays for the plastic she gets from other recyclers.