01 September 2008
From today, islanders are encouraged to write their telephone numbers on plastic bottles before recycling them as ‘Coke’s Big Plastic Bottle Recycle’ gets underway.
The competition is being run by the Transport and Technical Services Recycling Team and has been kindly sponsored by Coca-Cola.
The aim of the campaign is to increase the number of plastic bottles being recycled on the island by running a competition between now and December where two lucky winners will each receive £200. The winners will also be able to nominate a local school which will also receive a cheque for £200.
To enter, all you need to do is write your telephone number using a permanent marker pen on clean, empty plastic bottles and then take the bottles to one of the island’s 14 recycling sites. St John householders can also add the bottles to their kerbside recycling collection. The more bottles you recycle, the more chance you have of winning.
The first draw will take place during the week commencing 20 October 2008 and the second during the week commencing 8 December 2008. The winner of each draw will be contacted by telephone during the week of the draw.
Emma Richardson, Assistant Recycling Officer, said: “We hope this competition will be a tremendous success. It’s easy to enter and the prizes are superb but whether you win or not, the environment is the winner every time. We hope this competition tempts some new people into recycling as well as rewarding those already recycling.”
Denise Murphy, Marketing Manager for Cimandis (distributor of Coca-Cola in the Channel Islands) said: ‘As a supplier of plastic drink bottles, we are delighted by this opportunity to tell more people about how the empty bottles can be recycled. Plastic bottle recycling is still relatively new to Jersey so we hope this competition will raise awareness and lead to a long-term increase in recycling levels.’
The competition also conforms with Transport and Technical Services’ policies to encourage recycling with incentives. “I would always prefer to use the carrot rather than the stick and I am no fan of some of the draconian waste disposal penalties that have been introduced elsewhere,” commented Transport Minister, Deputy Guy de Faye. “Thanks to the generous support from Coca-Cola distributors Cimandis, responsible recyclers in Jersey can now win cash rewards for their efforts in collecting plastic bottles, which perhaps does confirm that things really do go better with Coke!”
More information regarding Coke’s Big Plastic Bottle Recycle is available at www.gov.je/recycling or by picking up a leaflet from Checkers and Safeway stores, Bellozanne Recycling Centre and La Collette Green Waste Site.