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Nominated for OUT OF THE BOX.NRW
Plastic Fischer
Cologne/Bangalore
Nominated by:
Sheila Sewar
Internet address:
Your business model in three sentences
Organizations finance our operations per kilogram of River Plastic collected, processed and third-party-verified. The sponsor receives footage and a better ESG rating. The positive exposure makes shareholders, employees, and customers happy.
What problem do you solve?
We are stopping River Plastic in order to prevent it from polluting the oceans. By using locally-built, low-tech solutions, we can operate at low-cost and are highly scalable in emerging markets. We are not a tech-provider but carry out end-to-end services: We deploy technology in polluted rivers and set up Sorting Facilities. Our full-time employees (+70 local jobs) collect the non-organic material and bring it to the facilities. We dry, segregate and compress the material. Recyclables are sold to local off-takers, non-recyclables are sent for co-processing (incineration with energy recovery). Our bootstrapped startup is (one of) the most efficient organisations tackling marine plastic pollution and could already collect and manage more than 500 metric tons of non-recyclable River Plastic (dry weight). Individuals and Organisations feel more and more the need and pressure to become part of solving world's biggest challenges and we are their reliable impact provider to convert their funding into social and environmental impact.
What's your digital solution?
We invented the "Plastic Fischer Credit" in 2019. Realising that the vast majority of our plastic is not recyclable, we decided to create a product similar to Carbon Credits: Every Individual or Company/Organisation should be able to fund our operations and receive a measurable product in return. As our product is environmental protection, we could only offer (Digital) Certificates. We wanted to make sure that not a single kilogram is double-accounted so we started tracking every kilogram that we ever collected from a system since April 2021. We can prove, when and where we collected what type of material and with this create the crucial transparency in the field of impact creation. Companies also receive monthly footage from our operations and details about the progress of our collections on their behalf. We now see an evolving Plastic Credit market which is growing rapidly. We ensure measurable, transparent, high-quality social and environmental impact.
Why should we award you for your digital business model?
Plastic Fischer was a First-Mover in many ways. We were the first organisation to focus on rivers to prevent ocean plastic. We were also the first organisation to use/sell Plastic (Fischer) Credits. It enables our organisation to convert funding from Europe/US/anywhere else into efficient impact in emerging markets. We keep it very simple and pragmatic and with this are one of the most successful companies in the world to stop ocean plastic pollution.