Build a solution that incentivizes corporations to source used plastic from communities in developing countries in order to create a socially inclusive and beneficial plastic sourcing process, encouraging corporations to invest and contribute to the upcycling economy and meet their corporate responsibility standards.

Watch the challenge deep dive video: https://youtu.be/czmtCGgHj8w

Our oceans contain an estimated 86 million metric tons of plastic comprised of five trillion individual items. The tracking and re-use of this plastic for upcycled packaging is growing, with initiatives including Dell’s Next Wave, VMware’s blockchain and DAML to track plastics origins.

Communities and individuals risk injury when sourcing the plastic, and corporations fear being held accountable for investing in child labour, as the communities cannot prove who sourced the plastic. Social aspects are the key challenge to the current process. 

Currently, the vast majority of plastic is not recycled, especially in developing countries. There are no open, fully inclusive and accessible upcycling marketplaces or incentives. To achieve a global, commercially viable ocean plastics supply chain, capturing the initial source of the recycled plastic is crucial