Lagos recyclers buy N4m waste drink cans weekly

Recycling companies in Lagos State currently source at least N4 million empty aluminium drink cans every month from scavengers and waste resource merchants.

A waste resource merchant, who chooses to be called Jaco, says there are about 10 companies in Lagos that buy empty aluminium drink cans and each one buys an average of eight to 10 tons weekly. According to operators, 10 tons of empty aluminium drink cans are worth about N500,000.

A representative of Duke Isaac Company, a recycling firm located in Ikorodu, who spoke with BusinessDay on grounds of anonymity, reveals that his company buys more than 10 tons of cans worth at least N500,000 weekly to recycle into aluminium sheets and aluminium cans.

“We buy a kilo of aluminium cans at N50, so 1,000 kilos, which is equal to one ton, is N50,000,” he says. A kilogramme of such aluminium cans contains about 74 empty soft drink cans, which may be soft drinks such as Coke, Fanta, different brands of malt, beer, energising drinks, and so on. To earn N50,000, the supplier would have to make available about 74 empty cans to the buyer.

The Duke Isaac Company representative says his firm recycles the aluminium cans into aluminium sheets to produce new drink cans for sale to some soft drink manufacturing companies.

“We have not started exporting because we have not even fully met local demand for aluminium sheets and cans. The company is owned by a Chinese in partnership with Nigerians, so we have intentions of exporting sometime in future,” he says.

Eno Akpabio, part owner of a waste management business in Lagos, says items such as iron materials, plastics, paper, rubber, food wastes, foams, glass are also recycled and therefore in demand, saying “companies buy the wastes they recycle from truck owners, cart pushers and scavengers. Those dealing in food waste for manure usually buy the wastes from accredited operatives of the Lagos State Waste Management Agency (LAWMA).”

Many of the companies recycling wastes are owned by Chinese and Indian firms, and many are located in Ikorodu, Ogba, Lagos Island, and Ota, Ogun State, according to Akpabio.

OLUYINKA ALAWODE