Through ReThink Plastic Vietnam’s “Design Factory”, students got the opportunity to create and showcase innovative ways to foster environmental sustainability.

75 students spent 6 months designing practical solutions to tackling plastic waste in the ReThink Plastic Vietnam Design Factory . In the process, teams have received support from business experts from IKEA, De Heus, BASF, An Phat Holding and Annam Gourmet

Plastic is not biodegradable, so plastics clog landfills and seep into groundwater. In Ho Cho Minh, 20% of plastics ends up in landfills, and given the city’s shortage of recycling facilities, we can assume most of the remaining 80% ends up in the rivers and ocean where it takes hundreds of years to decompose, leeching toxins into the food chain.

I love Vietnam, its people and its amazing food. But growing plastic use could harm the livelihood of millions and threaten the country’s food security. Vietnam is already the fourth worst ocean polluter of plastics in the world

“Rethink plastic Vietnam” seminar was held yesterday in HCMC with the participant of Dr. Carel Richter, Consul General of the Netherlands in HCMC; Deputy Director of the HCMC Department of Natural Resources and Environment (DoNRE), Dutch Business Association Vietnam, domestic, international researchers and businesses.

On March 18, at ISHCMC High School Thao Dien Campus, Ho Chi Minh City, 16 student teams from UEH / ISB, TDT, RMIT and Ho Chi Minh City Polytechnic University presented the prizes together. Measures against plastic pollution!

The Rethink Plastic Vietnam Design Factory is a 6-month program for university students. The mission of the program is to promote innovative, creative and inspirational solutions to 'design plastic waste' to reduce environmental pollution and build a plastic recirculating economy.

People throw plastic trash down rivers, into the vast ocean, they think it's out of their lives. But not so it came back in a more dangerous form. For ourselves, for our own children.

Today – 27 September 2018 –  the nationwide initiative “ReThink Plastic Vietnam” was launched under the supervision of government officials, community leaders and multinational corporations such as Heineken, Philips and Louis Dreyfus Company.

The Rethink Plastic Vietnam Design Factory is a 6-month program for university students. The mission of the program is to promote innovative, creative and inspirational solutions to 'design plastic waste' to reduce environmental pollution and build a plastic recirculating economy. On March 18, 16 student teams from 4 universities presented the prizes together. 

Vietnam’s population reached 93.7 million last year, and that total population generates nearly 18,000 tons of plastic waste a day. That’s 1.5 London buses of plastic produced daily.

I reached out to two of Vietnam’s NGOs, Rethink Plastic Vietnam and Precious Plastic Da Nang, to find out more.

“Plastic, especially disposable plastic, has become such an indispensable part of life that we don't even realize it,” commented Madeleine van Hasselt, co-founder of Rethink Plastic Vietnam.

ReThink Plastic Vietnam is an initiative that inspires businesses, governments and communities to take action together and solve the global issue of plastic pollution. “Only by joining forces we can tackle this global threat that affects us all”, says founder Madeleine van Hasselt.