4 minute read
‘Potty’ plant pot recycling
Walking along a busy residential road in the centre of St Helier, I spot the handmade sign Kalina Le Marquand has told me to look out for. Hanging on a side gate, in bright letters painted on a piece of reclaimed wood attached by a piece of old rope, the sign reads: ‘Potty Eco Pots. Please reuse! Take as many as you like.’
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I lift the latch and push open the gate. Behind is an alleyway no wider than a metre and it’s brimming with plant pots. Arranged neatly on shelves are a couple of dozen ceramic pots, some metal planters and a few wicker baskets. There’s even a pot shaped like a wellington boot. Beyond the racks are hundreds more pots, this time made of plastic, stacked waist-high. While most gardeners will admit to hoarding one too many pots in their garden shed, this is on another scale.
Avid recycler and environmental campaigner Kalina Le Marquand has helped save over 120,000 plastic plant pots from the Island’s incinerator, thanks to her garden reuse scheme - Potty Eco Pots. Hannah Voak finds out what’s next for the community project
Why does Kalina have so many pots stored in this inconspicuous alleyway?
‘In early 2021, I discovered that a skipload of plastic plant pots was being burned every week in the incinerator,’ she says. ‘It was just potty how many were finding their way into the waste stream.’ From that moment on, Kalina vowed to help clean up the Island’s plastic waste problem, sowing the seeds for a green reuse initiative she would later name Potty Eco Pots.
Most plastic plant pots are made from low-grade mixed plastics that cannot be recycled in Jersey so Kalina started by asking La Collette Household Reuse and Recycling Centre if they could save any pots left at the facility. ‘I then put them on E-cycle Jersey on Facebook and two local schools commented saying they would like to take them,’ she recalls. ‘Potty Eco Pots has grown from there.’
The project soon outgrew the narrow alleyway that runs alongside Kalina’s apartment building, so she started looking for ways to branch out. ‘We’ve now got two big collection boxes at La Collette and have various boxes at other sites, including Waitrose at Vallée des Vaux and behind SCOOP in St Lawrence. All the boxes are made from recycled materials by local carpenters.’ Islanders can drop off unwanted pots and trays at one of the collection points for others to pick up, free of charge.
In the scheme’s first year, Potty Eco Pots helped save around 120,000 pots from going to waste. ‘If these pots can be reused again and again before they hit the incinerator, then that’s great. It’s also helping cut down on imported goods to the Island. If people aren’t buying pots, they won’t be imported.’
Local organisations are also getting involved. ‘Samarès Manor, for example, is buying bare root plants and potting them in recycled pots, rather than importing plants in pots.’
Kalina currently works with a small group of volunteers who help collect and distribute the plant pots around the Island. But to cut back on transportation and reduce carbon emissions, she wants to expand the reuse scheme to every parish.
‘It seems wherever we go, people are wanting to have a box. The collection points will stop so many pots from going to the incinerator and will also cut down on people driving to the recycling centre to dump them. It will take a bit of time, but we’re going to have at least one box in every parish.’
‘We also go along to events such as the RJA&HS shows and parish eco fairs,’ Kalina says. ‘Lots of people recycle on a small scale, but at the Trinity eco fair we gave away a thousand pots.’
Community is at the root of Kalina’s initiative too. ‘It’s all about the gift economy, which in my eyes, is the future. At one event, someone took some pots and gave us marrows in return. Another person brought us some bread to give away. That's what Potty Eco Pots is about – being kind and sharing.’
Once all the parishes are covered, Kalina’s vision is to expand to other reuse schemes. ‘I’m thinking kitchen utensils, crockery, saucepans and cutlery. We’ve got all the resources we could possibly need, so the idea is to get the whole Island together to share these resources.’
Ultimately, the initiative will help reduce consumption and cut down on plastic waste. In the EU, many singleuse plastic products are already banned, including straws, cotton buds and disposable cutlery. In Jersey, a new law was introduced in July banning most single-use plastic and paper bags. Rather than plastic plant pots, gardeners can opt for biodegradable containers made from natural materials such as rice, coconut husks or wood pulp. Kalina suggests that homemade pots using old newspapers could also be the answer. ‘But as these plastic pots currently exist,’ she says, ‘we might as well reuse them as many times as we can!’
To find your nearest plant pot collection point, visit the Potty Eco Pots Facebook page.
