By Thabisani Dube
At 35, Simbarashe Munikwa knows that what many people see as rubbish can help put food on the table.
In Harare, Zimbabwe, Munikwa collects discarded plastic bottles and containers, sorting material that can enter the recycling chain.
“Every plastic bottle we collect adds a little more to our income,” Munikwa said.
His story reflects a contradiction at the heart of Zimbabwe’s plastic problem. For people such as Munikwa, discarded plastic is a source of income. For recycling businesses, it is a potentially valuable raw material. Yet for communities, local authorities and the environment, plastic that escapes collection can become a persistent waste-management burden.
Zimbabwe has people collecting plastic, community organisations organising clean-ups and businesses recovering recyclable materials. Nevertheless, substantial quantities of plastic continue to enter the environment.
The Environmental Management Agency (EMA) estimates that plastic accounts for about 18 percent of solid waste generated in Zimbabwe’s urban centres, making it the third-largest component by weight after biodegradable waste and paper.
Liberty Mugadza, EMA’s Principal Environmental Education and Publicity Officer, told New Ziana that the challenge went beyond litter.
“The problem should therefore not be viewed simply as a ‘plastic litter problem.’ It is a systems problem involving how products are designed, consumed, collected, separated, recovered, recycled and ultimately disposed of,” Mugadza said.
The consequences can extend from residential streets to waterways and wildlife habitats. Plastic can obstruct drainage systems, while stormwater can transport discarded material into rivers, dams and wetlands. Livestock may ingest plastic bags and packaging, and wildlife can be exposed through ingestion and entanglement. Open burning of plastic-containing waste can also release harmful pollutants.
A 2025 peer-reviewed study of informal waste pickers in Zimbabwe highlighted their contribution to the circular economy alongside the social and occupational vulnerabilities they face. Waste recovery therefore presents a dual challenge: preventing plastic pollution while ensuring that the people collecting discarded materials can earn a livelihood more safely.
In Gweru, Midlands Province, Loreta Ncube said collecting plastic had shown her that waste could have value when communities have opportunities to recover and recycle it.
“Plastic may look like waste to someone throwing it away, but for those of us who collect it, it can provide an income while helping to keep our communities clean,” Ncube said.
In 2023, EMA reported that Gweru had more than 10 registered waste-recycling companies buying plastics from waste pickers collecting material in residential and industrial areas.
In 2025, Midlands State University hosted a sustainable-waste management workshop involving EMA, Gweru City Council, Vungu Rural District Council and recycling stakeholders. Participants explored ways to turn discarded plastics into economic opportunities through circular-economy approaches.
These initiatives show that waste recovery is possible. The harder question is whether the wider system can recover plastic at a scale that matches the amount being placed on the market.
A July 2026 investigation by Oxpeckers, citing data from PET Recycling Company of Zimbabwe (PETRECOZIM), reported that approximately 5,500 tonnes of polyethylene terephthalate (PET) enter Zimbabwe’s market every quarter, while only 393 tonnes are recovered — a recovery rate of about 7.1 percent.
PET is commonly used in water and soft-drink bottles. It can be recycled, but recovery depends on an effective chain of collection, separation, transport and processing.
The figures expose a significant gap between the material entering the market and the quantity formally recovered. They do not, by themselves, explain every reason for that gap. They do, however, raise questions about the effectiveness of the systems intended to prevent plastic waste and return recyclable materials to productive use.
In its interview with New Ziana, EMA described a framework built around shared responsibility. Mugadza said the agency’s role includes regulation, environmental monitoring, enforcement, environmental education and coordination among stakeholders.
Zimbabwe’s Integrated Solid Waste Management Plan, introduced in 2014, provides a framework for reducing waste, improving service delivery and maximising resource recovery. Its approaches include source separation, recycling, composting, improved disposal systems, public education and stronger institutional coordination.
Mugadza said EMA trains and regulates waste entrepreneurs on proper waste handling and safety. Working with local authorities, the agency also supports the establishment of community-based organisations involved in waste recovery, while organised groups can approach the relevant structures for start-up support.
EMA promotes community participation through the National Clean-Up Programme and environmental education campaigns intended to encourage waste separation, reuse, recycling and environmentally sound disposal.
These measures outline the agency’s stated response. Their wider effectiveness, however, needs to be assessed alongside measurable outcomes: how much plastic is recovered, how collection services perform, whether recyclable material reaches processing facilities and whether regulatory requirements are being followed.
This is particularly important because community participation cannot replace the responsibilities of institutions, local authorities and businesses. Clean-up campaigns can remove waste already in the environment, but preventing further pollution also requires action on product design, packaging, collection and recovery.
Zimbabwe is working with the United Nations Environment Programme on a project to advance circular-economy approaches to plastic pollution. The project includes mapping plastic-leakage hotspots, updating the country’s plastics-flow inventory, identifying incentives for recycling and reuse, and preparing a roadmap for extended producer responsibility.
Extended producer responsibility is intended to increase producers’ involvement in managing the waste associated with their products. Its practical contribution depends on the requirements adopted, the responsibilities assigned and how implementation is monitored.
The need for effective policy is particularly visible in Victoria Falls, north-western Zimbabwe, where plastic pollution can affect communities, wildlife and the tourism environment.
Douglas Musiringofa, Campaign Manager of the Pristine Victoria Falls Society and founder of Afro Edge Volunteers, told New Ziana that consumer behaviour and unnecessary packaging were among the biggest challenges facing the town.
“The greatest challenge is a lack of appreciation from plastic consumers on how these impacts on the environment,” Musiringofa said. “People have no appreciation that we’re consuming or using much more plastic than we used to back in the days.”
He said it had become normal for goods to be carried in plastic bags even when reusable alternatives could be used.
A September 2026 report by African BirdLife estimated that Victoria Falls generates about 100 tonnes of plastic waste each month. The report said some plastic reaches surrounding wild areas, where it can be ingested by wildlife, while other waste is burned.
Ele-Collection pays local people to collect discarded plastic and processes it into construction aggregate. African BirdLife reported that the operation was processing about 30 tonnes a month and supporting more than 40 collectors.
The Wilderness Trust awarded Ele-Collection US$100,000 through its 2026 Wilderness Impact Challenge to scale up its plastic-recovery operations in Victoria Falls and beyond.
The project illustrates how recycling can connect environmental protection with local livelihoods. But the reported volume processed by one initiative also highlights the distinction between the contribution of individual projects and the overall quantity of waste generated.
Musiringofa argued that more ambitious measures were needed to reduce disposable plastic use and make community recovery efforts sustainable.
“The solution ultimately lies with a ban on single use plastic. We cannot completely abolish plastic but we can certainly control how much we use by simply banning single use plastic,” he said.
He added that such a change would require serious enforcement and investment, but argued that the benefits would outweigh the harm caused by plastic to human health and the environment.
The Pristine Victoria Falls Society reports that its waste-collection programme has reached 10 villages, collecting about 3,000 bags a month.
Further inland, around Hwange and Dete in Matabeleland North, plastic recovery is also being linked to livelihoods and environmental protection. Ele-Collection has reported creating income opportunities for collectors working around communities and wildlife areas, including Monde Village and Dete.
At Hwange Safari Lodge, plastic collected through an environmental initiative has been compacted and transported to Victoria Falls for conversion into construction aggregate.
Under the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) Zimbabwe Youth Empowerment Programme, the Trash Terminators have combined community clean-ups with recycling education. In one campaign, more than 35 volunteers collected over 90 bags of waste.
Together, these initiatives show that communities are participating in plastic recovery. They also demonstrate how local enterprises and waste collectors can turn discarded materials into resources when there are viable collection and processing opportunities.
But community action alone cannot establish whether the national waste-management system is delivering the results required. That demands transparent information about recovery rates, effective collection services, regulatory implementation and the responsibilities of producers and other stakeholders.
The accountability question is not simply whether EMA has policies or whether communities are willing to help. It is whether the measures being implemented are sufficient to reduce the amount of plastic escaping into the environment, and whether progress can be demonstrated through published evidence.
For businesses, this includes considering unnecessary packaging and the waste generated by their products. For local authorities, it includes providing effective waste collection and disposal services. For environmental regulators, it includes implementing their statutory responsibilities and monitoring compliance. For consumers, it means reducing unnecessary plastic use and separating waste where facilities exist.
The low PET recovery rate reported by Oxpeckers provides an important measure of the scale of the challenge. It also reinforces the need for reliable data to assess whether existing policies, recycling infrastructure and community initiatives are producing a meaningful improvement.
For Zimbabwe, the circular-economy debate has a very local face.
It is Munikwa bending down to pick up a discarded bottle. It is Loreta Ncube and other collectors in Gweru finding value in material others have thrown away. It is residents collecting waste around Victoria Falls and collectors working around Hwange and Dete.
And it is plastic still escaping into the environment despite those efforts.
The question is no longer whether Zimbabweans are willing to recover plastic. They are.
The question is whether the country can build a system capable of matching their effort — connecting community collection to infrastructure, markets, regulation and investment, while making its results transparent to the public.
For Munikwa, every bottle has a small value. For a recycler, it is raw material. Keeping discarded plastic out of natural habitats can reduce a potential hazard to wildlife.
For Zimbabwe, the same discarded bottle represents a choice: remain part of a linear system in which plastic is produced, used and discarded, or build a circular economy in which materials remain in productive use for longer.
The people at the beginning of that transition are already on Zimbabwe’s streets, sorting, collecting and recovering what others have thrown away.
What they need now is a system capable of matching their effort.
