Nigerian startup converts used tyres into valuables

One of the ways to address the growing rate of unemployment in Nigeria is by acquiring a viable entrepreneurial skill that will lead to creation of wealth.

This is so because Nigeria is heavily reliant on revenues from its oil exports and the clamour for white-collar jobs that are practically non-existent keep increasing.

This informed why a Nigerian entrepreneur Ifedolapo Runsewe set up Freetown Waste Management Recycle, an industrial plant dedicated to transforming old tyres into paving bricks, floor tiles and other goods that are in high demand in Africa’s most populous nation.

“Creating something new from something that will otherwise be lying somewhere as waste was part of the motivation,” Runsewe told Reuters.

“We are able to create an entire value chain around the tyres,” she said, holding a paving brick that is one of the company’s best-selling products.

Waste management in Nigeria is patchy at best. In villages, towns and cities, piles of waste are a common sight, and residents often burn them at night for lack of a safer method of disposal. Tyres are routinely dumped and abandoned.

In this edition of #GreenAngle, Esther Omopariola engages some of the key staff of Freetown Waste Management Recycle on the operations and challenges