Wecyclers Outcomes Partnership

Collection and recycling of plastic waste in Nigeria, along with the creation of decent jobs.

  • Location

    Nigeria

  • Launch

    Mar 2023

  • Area

    Waste Management & Job Creation

Collaborators & funding partners

  • Unilever

Delivery Partners

  • Wecyclers

Collaborators & funding partners

  • Unilever

Delivery Partners

  • Wecyclers

  • Mila founded and leads Bridges Outcomes Partnerships (BOP). At BOP, we work to radically improve human services and environmental initiatives to improve outcomes for people and value for society. Programmes BOP supports are dedicated to empowering people across the world to improve their lives, in areas ranging from education and wellbeing to housing, child protection, employment and environmental protection. Mila is on boards of Positive Families Partnership, Stronger Families, Forward, North East Lincolnshire Thrive, Ways to Wellness, Education Outcomes Partnerships, along with other family, employment, and refugee support focused programmes.

    Mila is also a Trustee for Clore Social Leadership, organisation dedicated to providing social leaders with world class leadership development.

    Prior to Bridges, Mila’s career spanned public, private, and third sector. Mila helped create and run Education Generation, a crowdsourcing social enterprise focused on enabling young leaders in low-and middle-income countries to participate in some of the world’s most forward-thinking education programmes.

  • Sophie’s role at BOP involves supporting the development and ongoing delivery of projects in the UK and high-income countries, like SPRING, as well as projects in lower- and middle-income countries, like Wecyclers.

    Prior to joining Bridges, Sophie worked for a global investor-incubator, backing entrepreneurs to create solutions-driven businesses, and earlier in real estate investment and asset management, leading on sustainability strategy.

    Sophie holds a BSc in International Hospitality Management, as well as an MBA from Warwick University and a certificate in SDG Investing from the Geneva Graduate Institute.

  • Lucia Santirso, Director at Bridges Outcomes Partnerships, has been working with Bridges for the last 6 years, during which time she has designed and implemented more than 10 Outcomes Partnerships related to:

    • Supporting young people in Kenya to take control over their health choices and paths to do more with their lives,
    • Improving the health and wellbeing of adults in the UK with long-term health conditions,
    • Helping elderly adults in the Netherlands improve their mobility and reduce their risk of falling,
    • Supporting unpaid carers in the UK to improve their wellbeing and sustain their caring role,
    • Supporting young people in the UK to attain better wellbeing and education outcomes, and
    • Supporting young people in the UK with special education needs to increase their independence towards adulthood.

    Before joining the BOP team, Lucia worked in Investor Relations at Bridges Fund Management. Lucia was also part of the Global Steering Group (GSG) Policy working group and is a co-author of the resulting report: “Catalysing an Impact Investment Ecosystem: A Policymaker’s Toolkit”. Prior to joining Bridges, Lucia worked in Equity Research at J.P. Morgan.

    Lucia holds a MSc in International Finance from HEC Paris and a BSc in International Business Administration from Rotterdam School of Management.

  • Callum is a Senior Impact Analyst working on our Stronger Families and Wecyclers programmes, providing analysis to support performance management and impact measurement.

    Prior to joining Bridges Outcomes Partnerships, Callum completed a Masters in Biochemistry at the University of Oxford. His research focused on dopamine signalling and Parkinson’s disease pathophysiology.

Overview

Nigeria recycles only 11% of its total waste. Supporting entrepreneurs to create plastic waste collection franchises contributes to tackling this challenge while creating decent jobs.

BOP has partnered with Wecyclers, a social enterprise in Nigeria focused on waste collection and recycling, to develop its franchise model for the collection and sorting of plastic waste in the country.

The programme is Bridges’ first outcomes partnership in Nigeria, its first with a corporate outcome funder Unilever, and its first outcomes partnership focused on both environmental and social outcomes.

Wecyclers’ franchise model supports sustainable employment in the waste management economy. Its framework involves training and supporting entrepreneurs to establish and run their own franchises, engage with local collectors, as well as employ balers and sorters. By providing them with the necessary equipment, Wecyclers can work in underserved communities and create and scale much-needed collection and recycling facilities, in order to reduce plastic pollution in the country.

Outcomes

Wecyclers Outcomes Partnership has collected 797 tonnes of plastic waste and created over 100 jobs in franchises since the project launched in 2023.

  • 797

    Tonnes of plastic waste collected

  • 109

    Jobs created