The average waste production per person per day is around 0.74 kg/day and an average of around 2.01 billion metric tons per year of which only 13.5% is recycled , and 5.5% is organic waste made into compost, over 40% is burnt openly , rest is disposed off in landfills, many of which do not follow the required regulations and end up contaminating the water table. Various agencies are looking into the global situation but very few have come up with actual solution as the waste production is at its peak and is set to increase by over 70% by 2050, there is a high end of life product which could be reused but unfortunately this is not economically viable in a price conscious society, the other problem is segregation which is a costly affair and would have helped if this was done at source, the domestic market being a major producer of municipal solid waste. This is being addressed in the developed nations but unfortunately the developing countries are still far behind and over 80% of domestic waste is still mixed and disposed off in unmanaged landfill or open dumpsites as there are no proper facilities to segregate and separate mixed waste. Unfortunately not many products are recyclable or recycling them would not be economically viable and this is seen from the amount of waste that ends up in incinerators for the production of energy, though this is not a commonly used process globally as only a few of the countries have these facilities but not enough capacity to handle all the waste. The same applies to many other biodegradable products which can only be recycled in specialized industrial facilities, for example biodegradable plastics, glass, wood, organic materials, oils both automotive and food grade, metals

Plastics is one product that attracted global attention due to its lifespan before degrading which goes into thousands of years, being such a versatile product it will also not easily move out of the circulation as fast as it came, this is due to the fact that there is still no replacement, to date the production of plastics is around 8.3 billion metric tons, of which 6.3 billion metric tons is waste of which only 9% is recycled and 79% is accumulated in landfills or in the environment as litter, and annually around 8 million metric tons ends up in the ocean. Most of the end of life plastic that ends up in recycling is turned into granules which end up back into the system as plastic products, unfortunately due to the high conversion cost of street waste into plastic granule the growth of the industry is still slow, this segment is also tied to just a few types of plastic which does not include thin materials and bottles. There now is more room for end of life plastics which can now be processed into fuel by pyrolysis a system which has evolved and is now economically viable as this helps cut down on fossil fuels, and its product is plastofuel which in its crude form can be used as industrial diesel and further research is in place to refine the fuel into virgin plastic. The other areas where mixed street waste can be used is in construction materials , which is plastic mixed with aggregate and converted into building blocks and paving blocks iCreate is in talks with various partners to enter into the recycling market in all three segments, currently we are into partnering with Vintz Plastics to venture into granule market and modernize their current recycling facility, this will also open the area of venturing into the other types of plastics which are not processed into granules and can be turned into fuel or building materials, the upscaling will continue as we partner with Community based organisations in Nairobi, Kenya to help solve the problems affecting developing countries. This problem is also part of a project in our makerspace challenge to incorporate IoT into waste management.

Currently, we have two sites in place which will serve the school sector and the multi dwelling residential areas, as both projects are directed towards social integration and collaboration , one being within high density residential complexes and the other being part of education institutions The main aim is to introduce tinkering and generation of ideas, the makerspaces will be areas where tools will freely be provided and people will have access to various tools and services that otherwise would not be economically viable to invest in for everybody. Makerspaces are more of small vocational training centers but unlike a curriculum based school these centers have no fixed method of teaching, they are designed to work as self learning centers where creativity and innovation are key and where there are no fixed boundaries, it is also a space which provides a sandbox to startups, as the design is one of no limits where artists meet coders and the innovation could be social to life changing applications.

Globally the food waste is approximate 1.3 billion tonnes annually out of which only about 5 to 6% is recycled into pig feed/swill, compost, or biogas production the rest of it goes into landfills and decomposes there which generates methane gas that affects the atmosphere causing a rise in greenhouse gases, this trend is also due to the increase in spending power and unethical trading practises where surplus food is destroyed to maintain a price balance, this trend is slowly changing as we move towards a zero waste society. iCreate is working with development partners to venture into the organic compost industry which will promote organic farming as well as introduce the self-production of food at grassroot level. This will also be in the form of creating small composting bins at household level thereby helping decrease what eventually would have ended up in a landfill. This will also help in segregating waste at household level.

14 billion litres of waste oil is generated annually of which less than 10% is recycled or refined the rest is either burned off as furnace oil or ends up being illegally poured in landfills or in rivers and ends up in the ocean. Much of this oil is classified as hazardous waste yet many countries do not have proper disposal facilities nor enough user awareness. iCreate is looking into this area of recycling and refining of waste oil into re-refined oil, Industrial

diesel oil and different types of grease, this project is still in final design stages, once operational this project will run hand in hand with the fuel from plastic project, as technology continues to move forward other uses will be found and will move towards a zero waste product.

Used cooking oil waste is one of the most neglected and taken for granted sectors in waste generation, as millions of litres of used cooking oil is either poured into the gardens or drains and left to clog the sewers or eventually finds its way into the water table. The recycling industry is now in its infancy and making great strides in refining and safely disposing of the oil, in Europe and America the industry is proving to show results in drains not clogging and main sewer lines showing signs of new ecosystems growing internally as the grease begins to wash away. iCreate is in talks with plant manufacturers to install used cooking refining plants for production of biodiesel and bioasphalt and is in talks with various institutes of higher studies to see how this industry can be tapped into and a step taken towards sustainable disposal of greasy wastes.