Following the release of ‘Talking Trash’ report which accuses major consumer brands of undermining legislation to combat plastic pollution, Kenya’s Environment Cabinet Secretary, Hon. Keraiko Tobiko, has come out strongly to warn industries that a ban on single use plastics is near unless the corporations come up with sustainable management of PET waste.
The CS was speaking at the celebrations to mark World Cleanup Day which was held at City Park in Nairobi, Kenya.
Hon. Tobiko stated, “Time has now come when private industry must either shape up or now face the consequences. Don’t force us into taking the painful decision of banning single use plastics, including PET bottles as we did with single use carrier bags. We have been trying to engage with you. Its been one conference after another. Its been one excuse after another. You spend more time lobbying from office to office.”
The CS accused Kenya Association of Manufacturers and Kenya Private Sector Alliance of going on a lobbying campaign to derail efforts to solve Kenya’s plastic pollution problem.
Clean Up Kenya in partnership with Changing Markets Foundation recently released a report documenting how consumer brands uses organizations like KAM and KEPSA to derail, distract and delay progressive legislation to solve the plastic pollution problem. Kenya Association of Manufacturers set up PETCO Kenya in 2018 as one of the tactics to stop government from acting tough on the problem of PET waste.
PETCO Kenya Chief Executive Officer, Joyce Wanjiru, early this year threatened Clean Up Kenya Founder and Patron with unspecified actions for talking about this problem. The organization also engages in green washing activities for leading consumer brands including Coca-Cola which is one of their major financiers.
The Talking Trash report is available at www.talking-trash.com
ABOUT CLEAN UP KENYA
Clean Up Kenya was established in 2015 to advocate for and promote sustainable public sanitation in Kenya. Since then we have become the de-facto national public sanitation advocacy brand. We are also experts in community mobilizing for cleanups. We have done numerous cleanups over the years, some of which have been attended by over 1000 volunteers on singular sites. These cleanups are meant to increase visibility on the problem of waste and it is therefore common to see our volunteers in bibs with one message, ‘Clean Up Kenya’. At the core of our work is honest and actual engagement in communities – not PR events. We also run advocacy campaigns holding duty bodies, consumer brands, green-washing NGOs, and other stakeholders to account for unsustainable public sanitation in Kenya and the global South. We receive no funding for our work but collaborate with others on projects.
