BSD – Brazil

Swiss Partners

B&SD Business and Social Development GmbH (BSD Consulting), Zurich,
www.bsdconsulting.com,
Beat Grüninger

Project Type:

Pilot project

Technology:

Resource efficiency

Country:

Brazil

Project Status:

Completed

Project Start:

2018

End of Project:

2020

Contract:

2018.08

Swiss Contribution

BSD Consulting has proven long-term experience in implementing sustainable supply chains, social certifications and green technologies. BSD Consulting Group has established important partnerships with international agenda setters such as the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI), International Integrated Reporting Council (IIRC), Social Accountability International (SAI) and the Global Clean Tech Cluster Association (GCCA).

Description

This project will help local companies improve the amount of material they recycle, to better manage their waste streams and to comply with national regulations regarding recycling. Second, it will formalize and improve the working conditions and incomes of waste pickers in Brazil. Under the leadership of BSD Consulting Switzerland and in close collaboration with HM Sustainability Consulting, Johnson & Johnson, HP and Kimberly Clark, BSD Consulting Brazil will coordinate and manage the project while acting as the local implementing partner. The program will initiate waste streams with a fully auditable mass balance system to five cooperatives in the region of São Paulo and provide technical support, training and application of the SA8000 Standard utilizing the Social Fingerprintingmethodology of Social Accountability International (SAI).

Results

At the project’s end, the recycled waste commercial streams (60-80 tons of paper per month and 8-10 tons of electronic waste) could be guaranteed between the seven participating cooperatives and the partners in the value chain. Thanks to the Social Fingerprinting action plans, 350 recyclers and their families benefit from improved financial stability and better working conditions in their cooperatives. The mass balance system is currently being developed.

Impacts

This socially responsible circular economy model has been consolidated and standardized. This opens up the way towards scaling up the process, while attracting potential new private sector customers. The project’s partners have decided to significantly increase the treated waste volumes, as well as the number of cooperatives involved.