Today we are chatting with Roman from Trash Hero, an organization that started in Koh Lipe, Thailand, and is now spreading all over Asia.
What does Trash Hero do?
The Trash Hero mission is to create sustainable, community-based projects that remove existing waste and reduce future waste by inspiring long-term behavior change.
We do this through:
Action and Awareness
We pick up trash. Whether a cigarette butt on the road, or 40,000 pounds (20,000 kilos) from island beaches — if we see it, we clean it. And as they say, actions speak louder than words. By spending just a few hours together picking up trash, people can see the real-world consequences of being careless about waste.
Education
We back up hands-on experience with educational information about the impact that trash has on the global environment.
Sustainable Projects
We create long-term projects that bring communities together to remove and better manage their waste, and strategies that reduce the amount of waste being produced in the future.
Inspiration
We motivate people to become Trash Heroes in their everyday lives. Trash Hero Thailand alumni have gone home to make their own heroic clean-ups around the world.
We believe that every one of us can be a Trash Hero. We invite everyone to read more about our projects, and join this global movement today.
How and why did it all start?
We just wanted to clean up one beach and had such a great day we thought many other people would like it. The first clean-up was in December 2013 with 17 people, with a group of locals and westerners from Koh Lipe, Thailand. We started asking for support from the local businesses, and soon enough there were more people. A year later we started Trash Hero Ao Nang, and as of today, there are more than 20 local Trash Hero chapters in five countries, with new requests every week.
How many people are involved and what are their roles?
We’ve got 9,800 volunteers across the globe helping to pick up trash. All of the 20 chapters worldwide have local members that organize cleanups, reusable bottle supplies or school education.
What are the main actions and areas of focus?
We organize trash pick-up and help promote waste management depending on the local systems.
We also offer a reusable bottle program in order to reduce waste. We manufacture the bottles and sell them at cost prices to our partners. They sell them locally and commit to provide free water refills to the people using reusable bottles. The aim is of course to reduce the use of plastic bottles.
Finally, we team up with local communities in order to run local school education programs.
How can people help?
People can show up at any cleanup, start their own Trash Hero chapters or donate money via our website.
