Plastic recycling business offers fortune to man who takes all risks

Agnes Winarti, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta | Sat, 11/22/2008

Leaving his job as a foreign bank auditor in the capital in 1999, Baedowy set off to explore the unknown world of plastic recycling. 

Feeling uneasy while his seniors and bosses anxiously faced redundancy after their 20 years of service, Baedowy decided to resign after his three years of working. 

"I was frowned upon by my parents," he said, recalling the time he told his parents about his resignation and intention to be go into the "waste business". 

Similar to most people who break into the recycling business, he said he did not start his business out of a concern for the environment. 

"I have to put food on the table for my wife and three children. I was looking for a business that only required a small amount of capital, generated enough money to met my daily requirements and would make me rich in the long run." 

Baedowy found that recycling plastic waste fit his three criteria. 

His business, however, failed in its first year because the plastic crushing machine he bought for Rp 20 million always malfunctioned. 

"During that year, I spent more time fixing the machine than recycling," he said, adding that there were times he regretted resigning. 

But the long hours spent fixing the machine paid off. Baedowy discovered ways to modify the plastic crushing machine, getting rid of its flaws. 

Baedowy also figured out new ways to sort and crush plastic waste. People started to visit his factory in Cimuning, East Bekasi, to seek his advice. 

He said other plastic recycling firms remained silent when he asked them for advice when he started out nine years ago. 

"The experience motivated me to be different. I prefer to welcome queries about my business," he said. 

"The more, the merrier." 

Today, Baedowy employs about 40 workers at his 1,000-square-meter factory and produces four to five tons of plastic scraps and pellets a week. His 60 business partners, from Naggroe Aceh Darussalam to Papua, each produce approximately three tons per week. 

His business partners come from all walks of life, he said, from fresh graduates and the unemployed to cooperatives and state institutions. 

His partners are taught how to manage their recycling businesses and are supplied with a modified recycling machine. They, in turn, sell their products to Baedowy. 

"I am not only giving the fish and the bait, but I am offering the whole pond." 

Baedowy has been exporting plastic scrap and pellets to Guongzhou, China, since 2004. 

"The typical problem with Indonesian plastic scrap and pellets is the quality. Through training, I ensure that all my partners are able to create products of international standard." 

Although his export business has contracted from 60 percent of his total business to 20 percent due to the global financial crisis, he said, he was not worried. 

"Prices can plummet or soar anytime. But as long as there are some margins to take, everything will be fine." 

In his factory, plastic glass scraps are recycled into raffia cord, while plastic pellets from plastic bags and sacks are remade into new plastic bags and sacks. Scraps from plastic bottles are recycled into polyester thread, while plastic pellets from buckets, lubricating oil and shampoo bottles are recycled into brooms, balls and piggy banks. 

He profits at least Rp 500 for every kilogram of plastic waste, which means a weekly production of three tons will bring a profit of Rp 1.5 million per week. 

Baedowy said his business contributed to the environmental campaign to some extent, by urging people to reduce, reuse and recycle. 

"It is important to make more people aware that waste is a profitable business," said the recipient of the government's 2006 Young Initiator Award. 

"That's the only way the green campaign will work here."