Turning waste into wealth

Every eight bottles can make a cool T-shirt and every 14 a stylish tote bag for multiple uses.

In Beijing alone, 5,000 Incom boxes like the ones at the World Cup venues are functioning, interconnected and monitored though the company's network.

The company's statistics show that more than two million people are active users of these smart recycling devices and more than 54 million plastic bottles have been collected since 2012, equivalent to more than 8,100 metric tons of petroleum saved, 55,350 trees planted or cutting carbon dioxide emissions by 4,050 tons.

Founded in 2003, Incom Recycle is present in more than 20 countries and regions besides the Chinese mainland, providing integral solutions to recycle and reuse industrial and household waste. It is representative of the growing recycling business in China.

Another representative, BGG Recycle, an innovative business-to-business platform for recyclable resources, has proven that the "dirty business" of waste management can be profitable, by making an annual revenue of 100 million yuan ($15.5 million) in the first year of operation.

Its founder, Anna Gui, a former Wall Street managing elite, started the IT company in 2016 to tackle the packaging waste problem worsened by the rapid surge of e-commerce in China. The convenient BGG app connects office buildings and companies with collectors, and after preliminary sorting the collected resources are sold to factories as raw materials.

"Our vision is to put the limited resources into an infinite circle of sustainability through innovation," Gui told Xinhua. The sector has always been profitable in China, even though the "garbage collectors" were often undervalued and their contribution to environmental protection underestimated.

By cutting the middlemen and increasing the collecting efficiency with the latest technologies, BGG has helped raise the recycling rate by 10 to 20 percent in nine Chinese cities, where they have been providing thorough, personalized solutions. The collectors working with the platform have seen their incomes rise by 50 percent or even doubled, Gui said.

"I'm optimistic about our business reaching more than 50 cities within three years. We will be providing services to more than 50,000 small businesses and collaborating with more than 100,000 collectors," she said.

It is predicted that BGG will rake in a revenue of 1 billion yuan in 2018, with more programs being implemented nationwide.

Besides domestic players, China also welcomed aides from the outside. TerraCycle, a UN Monument Award-winning waste management company based in Trenton, New Jersey, has joined the cause to tackle China's plastic pollution.