Enhancing Decentralised Recycling Solutions with Digital Technologies

The increasing use of plastics, mostly as packaging materials, has created a significant environmental threat that continues to escalate yearly. The challenges in the management of plastic waste have thereby created a worldwide crisis which has birthed a new planetary boundary menace. Plastic recycling has, however, been recognised as the most sustainable way of managing waste, with centralised systems primarily adopted in the Global West and locally decentralised approaches with digitally enabled small-scale enterprises emerging in Africa. Digital technologies such as mobile applications, geographic information systems and artificial intelligence, among others, have been integrated in common circular plastic economy models that focus on subscriptions, collections and processing of plastic waste. This chapter demonstrates that decentralised plastic waste management solutions offer significant social, environmental and economic benefits to stakeholders and therefore need to be supported by sensitisation and awareness of the use of digital technologies for localised recycling in communities.