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Behind every cardboard box is a natural resource - often a tree. In a linear economy, that tree is harvested, the box is used once, and then discarded into landfill. It’s a dangerous system because it takes without giving back.
A circular economy works differently. It keeps materials - like those used to make that box - in circulation at their highest value, for as long as possible. This only works when everyone plays their part.
A Circular Economy is an economic model designed to eliminate waste. Materials are recovered, recycled and reused. Think back to that cardboard box. If you recycle it, it ends up at Mpact Recycling, rather than in landfill. We process the cardboard, make paper using the recycled material, and sell it back into our business, Mpact Corrugated, who uses it to make the next round of boxes for packaging. That same material loops through the system again and again. We don’t just make a handful of new boxes from the material we collect at Mpact Recycling branches. We make tonnes of new ones. In 2024, Mpact Recycling collected and recycled over 580,000 tonnes of recyclable materials like cardboard, paper, and plastic.
One of the earliest real-world examples of the circular economy comes to us out of Kalundborg, Denmark. Here, a collection of factories began swapping waste materials and energy by-products with each other. What one site discarded, another used as raw materials.
South Africa has its own version. The Western Cape Industrial Symbiosis Programme (WISP) offers a free matchmaking service between businesses. It connects people who have excess materials like wood offcuts and plastic scraps with those who need them. Waste becomes input. Resources stretch further. And jobs are created in the process.
The circular economy isn't one idea. It’s a mashup of many, drawn from nature, design, and economics.
Mpact Recycling is only one part of its value chain. We act as the arm that collects and buys recyclable materials like paper, cardboard, and plastic from waste collectors, buy-back centres, and dealers across our 14 branches in South Africa.
The collected material is then sent to paper mills or plastic pelletisers, where it’s processed into reels of paper or plastic pellets. From there, they’re sold to manufacturers such as Mpact Corrugated and Mpact Plastics who distribute them as new recyclable packaging: delivery boxes, cereal boxes, long-life milk cartons, plastic water and cool-drink bottles, storage crates, wheelie bins, etc.
Mpact Waste Management is another part of our value chain, offering on-site waste solutions for businesses. These services help sort and recover recyclable material at the source and divert other waste streams like organic waste, hazardous waste and e-waste from landfill.
We’ve built a system where materials move in circles, not straight lines. One-part collects, another processes, another remakes and distributes.
Circular value chains don’t all look the same. What works here, in South Africa, might work very differently somewhere else. The truth is, how recycling happens and why it happens depends entirely on infrastructure, policy, incentives, and public mindset.
In Europe, recycling is institutional. It’s shaped by infrastructure, reinforced by policy, and maintained by a quiet social contract between citizens, government, and the environment. Most households sort waste into paper, plastic, organic/compostable, and general waste. In Germany, if you don’t sort correctly, your bin might not be collected. In France and the Netherlands, similar systems are enforced. And in high-density housing, social pressure does the rest (European Environment Agency, 2022).
Policy plays a role too. Many countries apply the “polluter pays” principle. If you generate more unrecyclable waste, you pay more. Pay-as-you-throw models, used across cities like Milan and Vienna, charge residents based on the volume of their general waste (European Commission, 2021).
In South Africa, recycling is entrepreneurial.
It creates employment and opportunity, much of it through the informal sector. People like Ezekiel Ramashia and Buyiswa Matenshi have been selling recyclables to Mpact Recycling for decades. Both now run successful buy-back centres, supporting their families and creating jobs in their communities.
We don’t have fines for failing to sort at home. But we do have legislation - Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR). Under Section 18 of the National Environmental Management: Waste Act, producers generating more than 10 tonnes of packaging a year must ensure that material is collected and recycled (NEMWA, 2021).
Businesses can join Producer Responsibility Organisations (PROs) like Fibre Circle, Polyco, or Petco who invest these funds directly into the recycling industry, supporting waste collectors, recycling infrastructure and businesses, and education.
In Europe, recycling is routine. In South Africa, it’s a livelihood. One is shaped by policy. The other, by necessity. But both are working towards the same goal: a circular economy.
That’s why we’ve built our business around it, to keep materials in use, reduce reliance on landfill, and help lower the cost of everyday goods.
Because every time something is recycled, it means:
Keeping the circular economy going is simple: separate your recyclables from general waste, leave them out for a waste collector or, if you have the volume, sell them to an Mpact Recycling branch or partner dealer.
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