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LIFE

The blood of life: Culture of Zulu women showcased at Durban museum

April 17, 2020 By Lizzie Stricklin

By Lizzie Stricklin

MAIN IMAGE: Zulu storyboards in the Phansi Museum depict a girl’s transition into womanhood. SOURCE: Lizzie Stricklin

Deep in what was once a Durban home, in a cramped, shadowy room, lies a glass shelf dedicated to unodoli. These beaded figurines are shaped in the form of a young girl but lack eyes and a mouth, so as not to “replace [the work of] God.” Small enough to fit in a child’s hand, they resemble a colorful toy – but these are not dolls made for play.

“You don’t play with a blessing around,” said museum manager Phumzile Nkosi.

These Zulu fertility dolls, or unodoli, are given to girls as they enter puberty. SOURCE: Lizzie Stricklin

These are Zulu fertility dolls, passed from mother to daughter to mark the daughter’s first period and passage into womanhood. Later, these fertility dolls may be given to a man to mark an engagement, and one day would be passed down to the next daughter in a continuous cycle of growth and creation.

At the Phansi Museum in Durban, which specializes in art from the nations of southern Africa, curated Zulu artifacts like the unodoli are brought to life by stories from Zulu experts themselves.

As she gazed at the fertility dolls on the shelf above her, museum manager Phumzile Nkosi recounted how her mother, like most Zulu mothers, did not tell her about menstruation before her first period. When her first period arrived, she “screamed and screamed”, Nkosi said.

By contrast, Nkosi described how recently she was shocked to discover a sanitary pad in her young granddaughter’s school bag, and to realize that her granddaughter was unceremoniously approaching what would have been a momentous life event in Nkosi’s youth.

The life of Zulu women is showcased throughout the museum, in the art of painted storyboards and handcrafted utensils. On one mannequin, the role of the wife as the bearer of children is woven into every aspect of the outfit on display: from her embroidered apron, which one day would be transformed into a baby blanket, to her circular hat, woven from the hair of her family and children and permanently braided into her own.

A traditional woman’s outfit features an apron that would one day be transformed into a baby’s blanket. SOURCE: Lizzie Stricklin

Through creatively curated displays and intriguing guided tours, the Phansi Museum connects primary stories to visual art to bring Zulu culture to light.

For Nkosi, the museum has rejuvenated her personal connection to her culture.

 “The museum restored the health of my culture,” she said. “When we came to the township, we had to hide everything … but now I feel proud.”

Elizabeth Stricklin

Antique collector dreams of finding new gems

April 10, 2020 By Skylar Thoma

By Skylar Thoma

IMAGE: The inside of World Travellers Importers & Retail Merchants in Durban. All of the items in the building are for sale unless marked otherwise. (Photo: Skylar Thoma)

“I’m frustrated.”

Fred van Blerk stands outside World Travellers Importers & Retail Merchants, the antique shop he’s owned for the past 25 years. Calling it a ‘shop’ perhaps does it a disservice: the 600-square-meter warehouse contains Van Blerk’s huge collection of antiques, including furniture, clothing, bicycles, and even the occasional foosball table.

An assortment of items found in Fred van Blerk’s antique shop. The foreground features relatively modern items, but it is surrounded by more antique furniture. (Photo: Skylar Thoma)

The extreme variety sets World Travellers apart, particularly because there isn’t a big antique scene in Durban. According to Van Blerk, in a “normal” antique shop, “you won’t see the big heavy pieces. You’ll see more funky stuff. But what I’m trying to show people is how to put different stuff together and not have that stifled antique feeling about it”.

Van Blerk’s love of collecting stretches back to his childhood. He found himself drawn to unusual items that date back centuries: “I really like stuff from the beginning of the Ottoman Period and the Persian movement through Egypt.”

But World Travellers is not his main job: Van Blerk also works as an interior architect. His professional work is exclusively modern, so many of his clients are surprised he also loves antiques. “They come to me to get that super modern, high tech interior”, he says. “That’s what I do [for a living], and it comes easy to me. If someone came to me and asked to do a period interior with stuff like this, it would be super easy. Because I love it, so I know how to put it together.”

In van Blerk’s office hangs a chandelier made by the same person who decorated the Palace of Versailles. He’s had offers to sell this item and many others for thousands of Rand, but he almost always declines. “I’m not thinking when I’m buying something, ‘oh, I could make so much money off this, so I’m going to sell it.’ Instead, I’m the reluctant seller. Every time Nico [his employee] comes to me and says, ‘oh, I sold this’, I go, ‘my god, I didn’t want that to sell!’” Instead, Van Blerk just wants to enjoy having the pieces he’s collected over the years. And by opening the store as a gallery and hosting music events for 100 people or more, he tries to share that joy with others as well.

But Van Blerk is looking for something more. Perhaps if he were to move somewhere else – maybe to Portugal – he might find a welcome for the treasures he has collected, he says. Perhaps Durban is not where he belongs.

Or perhaps it’s a bigger question, he admits: perhaps he might have made other choices in life.

“I feel like I missed my true profession. I would’ve liked to have been an archaeologist. I would rather discover that one little thing in my lifetime, that one little thing that is so precious and unusual, than having all this here.”

For now, Van Blerk continues to look for those items in his very own store.

LIFE

Albert Thabede’s Life of Faith

April 1, 2020 By Ainsley Ash

By Ainsley Ash

Many South Africans tell stories that have a marker: before and after democracy.

Albert Thabede remembers the earlier time well.

“Things were very, very bad,” he says, when he could not leave his house without his dompas.

But Thabede prefers a different before-and-after story: before and after a Monday morning in 1986.

“I was going to work. The man was preaching on a train. And then something [started] happening to me,” Thabede says slowly, staring into the distance that is the conglomerate of palm trees and pink houses and slumping clothes lines and vocal white taxis. He is sitting in a rusted folding chair on the back porch, and I am sitting beside him in a dilapidated seat covered with a piece of grey carpet.

Albert Thabede locks the door while leaving for church. (Ainsley Ash)

“He was preaching … Jesus. Then, my eyes were red. I was crying. I didn’t know what was happening to me,” he says matter-of-factly, with a crooked bright white smile on his face.

            His eyes are black, rimmed with a faint blue colour. Possibly from old age. He is 73 after all. Today he is wearing a grey-blue shirt with denim pants to match. He no longer has girlfriends or drinks Zulu beer, he says, unlike the men in his culture who do not know Jesus.

            I try to imagine a younger man with wholly black eyes overcome with emotion on the train to work. I struggle to remove the deep wrinkles lining his smile, and the white hair dotting his beard. [[lovely image]]

            Every Sunday morning and every Wednesday night, Thabede can be found in only one place: his church in Cato Manor. It’s where he finds his friends, his family, and his god. The congregation sings hymns half in Zulu and half in English. Baba confesses that he does not know all of the English words.

“Abancane kuYe bangabakhe… Babuthakathaka kepha Unamandla… Yes, Jesus loves me,” Thabede hums, and I hum along.

“That’s my favorite song,” he informs me. I agree. It is a lovely song.

The view from Albert Thabede’s back porch. (Ainsley Ash).

Even though Thabede is aging and his knees give him fits, he does not fear death, he says. He has done what he felt he was supposed to do: get a job, get a wife, and find his god. He does not seek wisdom or luck from prophets or ancestors or “grannies”.

“They say you get your job, because your grannies gave it to you. I don’t believe that now… I only believe in god,” he states with the wisdom of an older man with kind, blue-rimmed eyes.

LIFE

If walls could talk: the understory of Cape Town’s public art

December 13, 2019 By Martine Barker

By Claudia Stagoff-Belfort             

MAIN IMAGE: A mural in Salt River painted by South African graffiti artist Fok for the 2017 International Public Arts festival. SOURCE: Esa Alexander, Sunday Times

On the corner of Loop and Strand Streets in central Cape Town, a lighthouse stands ten stories high, bright and bold over the rush hour traffic that backs up through the central business district.

The lighthouse, painted in blues and yellows on the site of a downtown redevelopment project, is an intentional means of urban beautification, chosen to remind us of the city’s ocean heritage.

A mural created by Raak Wys and Cedar High School learner, Prince Buanda, outside of the school in Rocklands, Mitchells Plain. SOURCE: @Raak_Wys

Across the city at Factreton Primary School, black kale flourishes in hydroponic beds, spinach grows profusely in vertical tiers and fish live in tanks in the foyer. Worms are used as fertilizer, so that no water is wasted and the produce feeds 100 learners every day. Where once the walls at the school gates stood blank, now flashes of green, blue, purple and pink combine into vibrant images of vegetation and bees.

The mural in the working class suburb of Factreton, created by the Cape Town street art collective Raak Wys, and the lighthouse, a joint collaboration between Ukranian artist Aleksandr Nikitiuk and street art NGO Baz-Art, are glimpses into an evolving world of public wall art in Cape Town. Here artists are grappling not just with the way people see their work and how the city’s bylaws shape what they can do, but also with internal debates in the street art scene about credibility and aim. 

Street artists and graffiti writers across the spectrum are all trying to tell a story. The question is: how, where and with whom should the story be told.

Raak Wys enters the street art world with a specific focus. While some artists will gladly work on any free wall or space that is available, the thirteen-person collective argues that the location they choose not only matters, but determines the content they create.


A Raak Wys mural on the wall of Pool4Change, a non-profit working to create a school pool league in Seawinds. SOURCE: @Raak_Wys

Some in the public art community have criticized the City for welcoming street artists from elsewhere in the world whose projects change the face of the CBD.  

Raak Wys member Nabeel Peterson says that the street art push into Salt River and Woodstock that uses some non-local artists contributes to a perception that Cape Town is not designed by its people. For Peterson and the rest of the collective, it is important to give voice to community stories rather than incorporating external narratives.

“We want to use our collective tool kit to focus on the local narratives and stories that never get told,” he said.

But others feel strongly that international artists add a valuable extra dimension to street art in Cape Town.

International collaboration is central to the mission of Baz-Art, with the belief that this yields the added benefit of developing skills and broadening content.

Their work is two-fold. They host an annual International Public Arts Festival when international and local artists come together to create art on the walls of homes and other buildings in the suburb of Salt River. They also consult with city authorities, individual home-owners and owners of corporate buildings to find places to produce art, and jobs for the street artists they work with.

A mural painted by Brazilian artist Aleksandro Reis for the 2019 public arts festival in Salt River. SOURCE: Esa Alexander

Baz-Art has painted over 100 walls in Salt River since the inception of the festival four years ago.

“Bringing international artists to South Africa allows for an exchange,” said Alexandre Tilmans, Baz-Art founder.  “For artists who haven’t had the chance to go abroad and travel, they get to learn more about what’s happening on the other side of the world in terms of skills, knowledge, possibilities. It shows artists that it’s possible to be a professional street artist and make a career out of it.”

Salt River resident, Anthea van der Brock first learned of the work of Baz-Art when they came looking for viable walls to paint near her home. Involved in the tourist industry, she soon became a Baz-Art street art tour guide. Van der Brock echoes Tilman’s words, saying that the festival, “puts our artists on the international level, pushing us up onto the international platform.”

Members of Raak Wys have a different approach. They are concerned to create public art that is strictly connected to the residents and beneficiaries of those spaces. In addition to telling local stories, it provides the opportunity for people living nearby to engage with art. 

“We realized that growing up none of us really had art in our homes. What would happen if everyone had the same opportunity [to be exposed to art at a young age]?” Peterson said.

Writers Only, a new Cape Town graffiti group comprised of “writers” Fersyndicate, Smet and Nardstar, is using another form of public art to tell local stories. Historically, graffiti artists have referred to themselves as “writers”, as distinct from street artists who have branched away from the “pure” form of the art.

The Writers Only graffiti battle at the House of H restaurant in August 2019, the character battle theme was “underground”. SOURCE: Matthew Warely

For them it is important to keep graffiti in Cape Town viable and alive. Fersyndicate, whose real name is Quasiem Cassiem, says it is a dying art form.

“There’s a big educational part of it because we need to demystify the stereotypes. People see graffiti artists as people who come out as night, like vampires, and just cause all sorts of havoc, but we are the geekiest people in all honesty. We’re just trying to paint the right picture and combat the propaganda that comes out in traditional media,” said Cassiem.

They argue that removing true graffiti from city spaces santises urban areas and hides realities that need to be recognised.

Graffiti is rough around the edges, said Cassiem, arguing that the less challenging “street art” – what he calls “the cousin of graffiti” – is an easier buy-in for the public. The traditional “tag” of graffiti is a central part of the work that Writers Only do.

They want the public to respect and appreciate the tag as much as the mural, hoping to combat the notion that the existence of graffiti is synonymous with crime.

“Your grandmother can appreciate street art, but she’s not going to like graffiti. There is a beauty in graffiti, but it’s not for everyone and we understand that.”

Many artists participating in public art recognize that working with the City is both inevitable and essential.

Writers Only is all too aware of the history between the authorities and the graffiti movement and envisions a collaboration in which there is room for education – both for the “writers” and the City.

“We are planning to work with the government. We’re trying to have an open dialogue with the City instead of working against them. If [graffiti artists] need a permit, we want to help educate them about how to get a permit, making it easier. If we can help teach the next generation, they can choose to do it this way,” Cassiem said.

Artists are increasingly capitalising on the fact that the City has begun to value public art.

“I think that Cape Town wanting to position themselves as the capital of art in Africa makes street art relevant. You cannot be a capital of the arts by forgetting some part of the industry,” Tilmans said.

Yet, interest and participation in public art remains concentrated in specific parts of the city. Raak Wys feels that the city’s level of engagement and regulation in different areas is a reflection of how it values certain spaces.

“The spaces we work in, fortunately, but also unfortunately, [don’t get] much surveillance and a lot of the work we do is internal – not visible outside. But

[in]

the areas we are working in, no one has bothered us,” said Peterson.

“I think this speaks to the politics of Cape Town ‘if it’s not in the city, we’re not going to bother to police the art’ – so it’s an interesting space that we’re working in,” he said.

Raak Wys, whose goal is to paint twenty spaces by the end of 2019, has finished eight murals, which, in addition to the one at Factreton Primary, include the Lawrence House Child Care Centre in Woodstock, Cedar High School in Rocklands/Mitchells Plain, and the building of the NGO Pool4Change.

Raak Wys’s “Stop the Crime” mural in a park in Kensington, reflecting calls for safety and unity in the community. SOURCE: @Raak_Wys

Youth are central to the spaces where Raak Wys work. They want to create an environment in which street art doesn’t start and end with the individual mural they create. Rather, the collective hopes that once sufficient funding is secured – presently the main barrier to their projects – collaboration with children and residents at schools, local organizations and community spaces will lead to a more evolved notion of public art. They view youth education and empowerment as central parts of this vision.

For the piece at Cedar High School, a learner from the school, graffiti artist, Prince Buanda, was the force behind the mural, using his signature style to create monotone heads with cogs substituting the place of a brain. 

“We want to facilitate a space that allows young people to step up and participate,” Peterson said.

Factreton headmaster Paul McAvoy explained how the mural had impacted the learners at his school, and the community as a whole.

“The mural has created curiosity for both the parents and learners, it’s encouraging youngsters to start dialogue about what’s on the mural. It shows that there’s something other than drugs and nasty things, that life can be balanced and exciting,” he said.

“What I love about the [art] work is that it’s not a one size fits all approach,” he added, explaining that nature was chosen as the theme of the piece after a lengthy collaboration process with the artists involved. McAvoy wanted the wall art to reflect the school’s values and reinforce his vision of the school as a hub around which the community can evolve.

Baz-Art says their 2019 festival theme emphasised education, collaboration and empowerment of youth. The topic was aimed at bringing in younger voices from around the world. Up-and-coming artists, some of whom are the children of street artists and graffiti writers, were given the chance to bring a fresh perspective to the art form.

Writers Only’s Cassiem agrees that youth are key.

“More than anything, we want kids to have some sort of point of reference – it’s about keeping [graffiti] alive because it’s one of the biggest art movements in Cape Town,” he said.

The politics of the street art and graffiti scene reflects that of the contested spaces and history of the city with which the artists are actively engaging.

Despite their different approaches – whether it be for the purpose of beautification, expression or activism –  all the artists believe strongly in the power of paint and storytelling in urban spaces.

“We want to create artwork that anyone can own,” said Peterson.

** Claudia Stagoff-Belfort was reporting from the Sunday Times newsroom in Cape Town when she produced this report

LIFE

Fifty Shades of Pale

December 4, 2019 By Admin

By Maggie Connolly

MAIN IMAGE: Several shelves of makeup on display in a shop in Cape Town’s China Town mall. Products here are priced much lower than in other outlets. Source: Maggie Connolly

The woke wave has reached the global beauty industry.

Twenty years ago, darker-skinned South Africans, would have been hard-pressed to find products that suited their skin types or their skin tones.

But now brands fighting for their slice of the R25 billion South African retail cosmetics industry have begun to bring in shade ranges across the board. The catch is that these brands suit the wallets of very few people – and they don’t always address local needs.

While it is true that the cosmetics sections in supermarkets and pharmacies are filled with options, this is only true for some. A black South African would be lucky to find a shade that perfectly matches their skin. A white South African would have at least ten options to choose from and would most likely find a shade that matches their skin tone and type.

In most stores, people with lighter skin can find an inexpensive concealer that suits their tanned summer skin or fairer winter skin. It’s a quick in and out, no need to spend 20 minutes searching through the shelves for a brand that might carry something that works for them.

The market is leaving out a key consumer. 

Makeup professionals say many international brands treat darker-skinned women’s needs as an afterthought. But some local brands are trying to close the gap.

Enter Swiitch Beauty: a rising South African makeup company created by 19-year-old Rabia Ghoor. It has middle-of-the-road prices and makeup that is aimed at women of all skin colors. The company may not have hundreds of products on offer, but each product caters for their consumer, or more importantly, their South African consumer.

Ghoor came up with the idea for her company at the age of 14 with a very specific goal in mind.

“This is South Africa,” she said. “For the most part every high-end brand offered here is either American, European or Australian.” 

She decided to make it her business to bring something new to the local cosmetics offering.  

She said the big corporates make products for particular international markets. 

“Then they try to sell those exact same products to Africans. This consumer has a completely different set of skin conditions and trend awareness.”

She argues that it’s the responsibility of the brand to genuinely put the consumer first – and listen to feedback.

“I think the question that most beauty brands are facing now is how do we make [the consumer] feel like a part of it. I think it would be better, instead of trying to make them feel a part of it [by importing products tailored for other markets] just make them a part of it. Just involve them.”

Ghoor attributes her success in part to the fact that the bigger brands have not been creating products specifically for South Africans until recently. Now some are grappling with the new expectations of their consumers. 

But, says Ghoor, this is not always done with adequate thought or product curation. Brands may release dozens of new shades of foundation that are aimed at demonstrating a new wave of “woke” culture but may still leave consumers feeling under-served.

Even some of the biggest brands have begun to recognize that they have been behind the curve.

“The conversation [about the need for diverse shades] has been around forever,” she said. “It’s just now that brands are waking up. You see brands coming out with 40-plus shades of foundations and making a huge hype around it. The consumer says, Rhianna did that three years ago, you guys are late. You’re just here for the hype.

https://www.instagram.com/p/B0qsUzoBr9M/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link

“What they don’t realize is this consumer that they’re talking to is incredibly well educated. She can spot that inauthenticity from a mile away,” Ghoor said.

Another barrier for consumers is the issue of price.

Mmatlala Mabotja, who owns local brand Fancy Sapphire Cosmetics, thinks young people shouldn’t feel pressured to get the whole range of makeup all at once. Over the past 20 years, the scope of makeup has grown dramatically. These days consumers face an overwhelming number of product options – from foundations to highlighters, bronzers and eyebrow kits. This becomes unaffordable.

“They obviously [then] go to cheaper places, but I wouldn’t recommend this because this is your skin we’re talking about. You need to invest in high quality products,” she said. Rather, first-time buyers should save their money for fewer higher quality products.

Dermatologist Dr. Nomphelo Gantsho agrees that it matters what you put on your face.

She is concerned about the easy availability of cheap, poor quality products.

At the bottom end of the market, untested products are available for very low prices in outlets such as those at Cape Town’s China Town and on street corners. A cheap foundation that claims to provide perfect skin coverage can cost as little as R20 at such stores.

These products are generally unregulated.

“The problem is that the industry for illegal products is very big,” said Gantsho. “Things get taken off the market and they come back under different names.”

And it’s easy for those products to return, regardless of where they’re manufactured. According to Gantsho, South Africa’s borders are “porous,” and the cosmetics easily find their way into the country. There are also products that are manufactured illegally locally.

For a person on a budget, prices as low as R18 for a concealer, R35 for a kit with four bronzers and R12 for a lipstick are hard to beat.

These products don’t undergo the same clinical trials that high-end brands like MAC, Bobbi Brown or Benefit do. The middle- to lower-end brands that are sold in supermarkets and pharmacies will also have been tested professionally.

This is required by law. The brand or individual responsible for a product must also keep records on the testing for at least 10 years.

Gantsho said some of the most common harmful chemicals that may be in cheap products include topical steroids, hydroquinone and mercury.

Not only are these products potentially risky, they’re also “rubbish” according to makeup artist Marlinette Newman who has been in the business for 11 years.

Newman, who is herself a frequent Chinatown shopper, said she picked up a counterfeit Benefit ‘Benetint’ 3-pack to see what the knockoff had to offer.

“It’s rubbish – the (colour) payoff and performance. It was obviously nothing like the real deal.”

The originals cost much more and rely on the fact that they are generally of better quality to attract consumers. But, she said, many cosmetics are priced above the actual cost of manufacturing that product. 

Tubes of foundation on sale for just R25. Some cheap brands contain chemicals that are harmful to skin. Source: Maggie Connolly

And some of the lower-priced brands are worth exploring. Among her favourite products, for example, is a low-priced mousse foundation which she said lasts long, blends well and is pigmented.

Newman said despite industry efforts to change things, shade range is still an issue for buyers.

While less expensive brands like Essence do have colors for darker skin tones, these are often limited to just a few. They offer nowhere near the same kind of range as brands like MAC, which she says is at the forefront of diversification in the makeup industry.

Makeup artist Marlinette Newman has been in the business for 11 years.
Source: Marlinette Newman

She credits Marco Louis, MAC’s Global Senior Artist for Sub Saharan Africa, with changing the way some brands operate. After living in Nigeria for several years, he came back to MAC with a plan.

He had encountered women who would spend a lot of time mixing their own foundations when they could not find anything to match their skin tone. According to Newman, Louis approached the company’s development team and showed them one of these mixed shades. He urged the team to branch out, arguing that they needed shades for these women.

Newman considers MAC and American brand Bobbi Brown as leaders in creating a wider color palette – an “ethical trend” that has trickled down to other international, lower-end brands in the last few years.

However, some of it is “smoke and mirrors”, she said. “They go: ‘This is who we are’ but they’re not always complying with it.” Even when brands release big new shade ranges, most of them only work for lighter skin tones.

However, South African brands like Sorbet, she said, are doing it right. They recently launched a line of 40 foundation shade and are busy redeveloping their offerings by looking at what’s selling and what’s not.

“I think local brands’ headspace is within the market and it is more relevant.”

But she is quick to say that international brands are not the enemy. Newman just thinks they’re missing something essential.

She said brands need to focus more on educating the consumer on what works for them.

The prominence of Instagram influencers who promote particular trendy makeup styles leads brands to cater for these specific looks. Current trends, for example, include the use of heavy bronzer to define the face and dark, unblended eyeshadow in the crease of the lid. Newman says these popular styles don’t always suit the ordinary person.

“It’s not actually personal to them. It’s not something that’s going to make them look more like them,” Newman said.

However some of it is “smoke and mirrors”, she said. “They go: ‘This is who we are’ but they’re not always complying with it.” Even when brands release big new shade ranges, most of them only work for lighter skin tones.

However, South African brands like Sorbet, she said, are doing it right. They recently launched a line of 40 foundation shade and are busy redeveloping their offerings by looking at what’s selling and what’s not.

“I think local brands’ headspace is within the market and it is more relevant.”

But she is quick to say that international brands are not the enemy. Newman just thinks they’re missing something essential.

She said brands need to focus more on educating the consumer on what works for them.

The prominence of Instagram influencers who promote particular trendy makeup styles leads brands to cater for these specific looks. Current trends, for example, include the use of heavy bronzer to define the face and dark, unblended eyeshadow in the crease of the lid. Newman says these popular styles don’t always suit the ordinary person.

“It’s not actually personal to them. It’s not something that’s going to make them look more like them,” Newman said.

Captions List:

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Marlinette Newman, makeup artist, poses for a photo. Newman has worked in the makeup industry for 11 years. Photo by: Marlinette Newman

Image name: Newman.jpeg

Maggie Connolly

Greenwashing in the plastics debate: The hidden cost of ‘better’ choices

December 4, 2019 By Admin

By Kimberly Wipfler

MAIN IMAGE: Trash waiting to be sorted at a recycling centre in Cape Town. Source: Kimberly Wipfler

If you’ve opted for a “green” alternative to a plastic product in an effort to help the environment – such as a paper straw or biodegradable coffee cup – you may have been duped.

Environmentalists are increasingly concerned that manufacturers who are offering replacement products may in fact be making the global plastics crisis more difficult to solve. And, they argue, many of the strongest selling points of these products are just not true. In some cases, the “better” product you’ve selected may even be more damaging than the original.

Anti-plastics activist Karoline Hanks calls it classic greenwashing. “They’re making money off people’s good intentions. It’s brutally dishonest.”

Hanks runs numerous campaigns to try to change the way people make consumption choices. The straw debate is one she has personally tested.

The move to alternative straws has gathered momentum since a 2015 video of a sea turtle with a plastic straw lodged in its nose went viral (link) and in the wake of growing awareness of the damage single-use plastics cause to marine life.

The public outcry over their impact has pushed restaurants to move away from providing them. Many now serve alternatives, like paper straws, or have stopped handing them out altogether. But customer dissatisfaction with paper straws, which quickly become soggy, has been a challenge for the food industry.

New options have come into the picture: straws made from “biodegradable” or “compostable” plastics. Patrons can feel good about their green straw choice without risking the inevitable crumbling of a paper one.

Karoline Hank subjected three pieces of ‘compostable’ straw to different environments for a three-month period. The condition of each was unchanged. Source: Kimberly Wipfler

Hanks was served a compostable straw at a restaurant this year and decided to test it’s claim. After three months, sections of the straw kept in three different environments – in her compost heap; in a jar of seawater; and in the open air – showed no visible difference, and no signs of fragmenting.

“In that time, think of the damage that’s been caused. In those three months, these things have choked something, gone up someone’s nose, or become microplastics. Don’t give me this biodegradable bollocks,” Hanks said.

Her home test is backed up by research conducted by UK scientists at the University of Plymouth who found that after three years, so-called biodegradable plastic bags that had been buried in soil or left in seawater were still able to carry shopping without breaking.

Many other products are now promoted for their compostability – from coffee cups to cling wrap and shopping bags.

Plastics SA, which represents a range of players in the industry including polymer producers and importers, converters, machine suppliers, fabricators and recyclers, argues that the misconception that biodegradable plastics will decompose and disappear when left in the environment makes people more complacent. The danger of this thinking, they say on their website, is that research shows consumers are more likely to litter when they believe their waste will decompose. Not all “biodegradable” plastics will do this.

So-called “compostable” plastics pose a similar challenge. Although these items are manufactured to stricter standards – they’re technically required to decompose under industrial composting conditions within three months – it is not immediately clear to consumers that this requires particular conditions which are controlled for factors like temperature, humidity, and aeration.

Compostable and biodegradable plastics need professional processing and will not disintegrate in a normal domestic setting, or in a landfill. 

The difficulty with these products has a ripple effect in the waste chain.

A formal recycling centre in Cape Town.

In South Africa a key role in this is played by waste pickers who rely on collecting recyclable materials for a living. They collect bags of cans, plastic, cardboard, paper and other saleable materials from refuse bins and landfills, frequently having to travel several kilometres to sell them to formal and informal buy-back centers.

Nompumelelo Njana, a waste picker from Khayelitsha, has been collecting recyclable items from trash bins since 2007. A kilogram of cans, she said, will sell for R8.

Nompumelelo Njanja has worked as a waste picker since 2007. Source: Kimberly Wipfler

Njana works as a coordinator for the South African Waste Pickers Association which is trying to have the law changed, and is hoping to negotiate a more formal role for waste pickers in the waste cycle.

According to WWF, waste-pickers are responsible for collecting 20% of recyclable materials in South Africa, and they account for as much as 80% of recyclable PET bottles. The South African Plastics Recycling Organisation (SAPRO) website says waste pickers saved government R748.8 million in 2014 through their informal recycling services, yet waste picking remains an illegal activity.

Despite it being against the law, there are buyback centres in most cities in South Africa. On the outskirts of Stellenbosch 200 to 300 waste pickers turn up every day with materials to sell. It’s a precarious existence. The price of recyclables can fluctuate dramatically, depending on supply and demand, and what might be desirable today may have no value tomorrow if there’s no market for them.

The arrival of “biodegradable” plastics has made the job of waste pickers and recycling plant owners even more difficult.

Johan Conradie, director of recycling plant Myplas, speaks with waste picker Nompumelelo Njanja. Source: Kimberly Wipfler

Johan Conradie, director of recycling plant Myplas, said because the plastic alternatives look just like regular plastic, waste pickers may gather these items and be unable to sell them. But more importantly for consumers down the line, these products can contaminate recycling processes and pose a threat to the durability of the new, recycled items they become.

This would not only jeopardise the quality of the product it would also jeopardise adherence to international standards. Currently, Myplas is one of two recycling plants in SA that meets ISO 14001, the international environmental management standard.

Conradie, who also serves as chairman of SAPRO, said it would be better to ensure that recycled plastics are made from quality materials than to promise various degrees of degradability that are poorly understood. If quality plastics were used in the recycling industry, products would stay within the economy for longer instead of heading to landfill.

“In the end, circularity is the more long-term, sustainable solution,” he said.

“You’re never going to be able to feed 8 billion people without plastic. You would literally not be able to sustain the earth. The question isn’t, ‘Is there a place for plastics?’ It’s, ‘What do we do with the plastics when we’re done?’, and that’s the tricky bit.”

A WWF media release argues that a raft of limiting factors in the recycling industry means that a lot of material that technically could be recycled goes to landfill or ends up in the environment. These factors include a lack of infrastructure and poor collections systems, market conditions, a lack of equipment and budgetary constraints as well as over-engineered materials.

Another issue is the way packaging is labelled. According to Zaynab Sadan, a project officer for the Circular Plastics Economy Programme at WWF, unclear labelling means that non-recycling materials get sent to waste management facilities. At some, such as at the Kraaifontein Integrated Waste Management Facility, these are hand sorted into recyclables such as paper, tins, plastic bags and cardboard and the rest is sent to landfill.

Janvier Rusasa, assistant plant manager at Kraaifontein said that the plant receives waste from almost 30 000 households and processes about 1 000 tons of waste each day.

About 20% of the waste it receives is plastics, and at least 12% goes to landfill.

In an effort to make it easier for consumers to recycle their plastics WWF has secured commitment from six major retailers in SA to print clearer packaging labels. Currently, packaging is marked with a triangle that is made up of three arrows which surround a number that indicates what kind of material it is made of. Consumers need to look up the codes as they do not directly state whether materials can be recycled.

The new design will state clearly which packaging component it refers to, whether it’s recyclable, what the packaging material is, and whether it is already recycled.

Old recycling labels which are hard to interpret are set to be replaced by some of the big retailers in South Africa.
New labelling for products, indicating how to recycle them.

Woolworths, Clicks, Spar, Shoprite, Checkers, Pick n Pay, and Food Lover’s Market will all soon adopt this new labelling. This effort is part of a larger initiative led by WWF and SAPRO to decrease plastic waste, known as the South African Plastics Pact.

WWF’s Project Manager Circular Plastics, Lorren de Kock, welcomes recycling efforts but says it is not the answer to the wider plastics problem.

“Ultimately, we need to stop generating more and more plastic waste and to find ways of reducing our consumption and reusing the materials that are already in the system in a meaningful way. While recycling is part of the answer, it is not a panacea for the plastic waste problem and industry and government must also get involved,” she said.

Consumers must also put pressure on producers by speaking up and refusing non-recyclable products. However, de Kock agrees that this is harder for poorer people to achieve than it is for wealthier consumers who can afford more expensive alternatives. 

“It’s difficult because plastic is the cheapest material out there, and our poorer communities rely on it for packaging. You can’t tell someone in an informal settlement not to buy the cheapest product on the shelf because it’s wrapped in plastic.” she said.

Capetonian Karoline Hanks is a champion of the fight against plastics. Source: Facebook

Hanks believes that those with the means to act must do so and she is actively working to change the behaviours of her peers. The endurance runner, plastics activist and environmental writer is the co-driver of a national campaign to change the way water is managed during running races in South Africa. The #icarrymyown campaign is gradually gaining traction and race organisers are beginning to turn way from plastic sachets – instead providing water tanks that allow runners to refill their own containers.

“It’s a radical shift in how we move, what we drink, what we eat, everything. Interrogate everything. Be curious. Double check. Test it in your own compost heap.”

It’s time to rattle cages, she said.

“We can’t mess around anymore; we can’t keep talking about it. We’ve run out of time for meetings.”

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