Buddhist church recycles cosmetic bottles into monks’ robes

At a Buddhist church south of Bangkok, a priest watches as a appurtenance presses down on thousands of H2O bottles, before a hulk scoop of dejected cosmetic rolls out with a thud.

The cosmetic is unfailing to be recycled into polyester fibers, that will be done into fabric for saffron-colored robes for monks.

The recycling church of Wat Chak Daeng is one splendid instance of recycling for Thailand, one of 5 countries that comment for some-more than half of cosmetic in a world’s oceans.

The monks have dejected 40 tonnes of cosmetic over dual years given starting a program, aiming to quell cosmetic rubbish entering a Chao Phraya River, that flows south to a Gulf of Thailand in a western Pacific Ocean.

“I’m practicing a Buddha’s teachings, that also align with elucidate a tellurian environmental crisis,” says Phra Maha Pranom Dhammalangkaro, 54, priest of a church in Samut Prakan province, usually south of Bangkok.

Bottles for blessings

Unlike many temples where people give monks donation like food and clothes, devotees float bicycles here to offer cosmetic bags and bottles in sell for Phra Maha Pranom’s blessings.

“Donating one kilogram (2.2 lb) of cosmetic bottles can assistance make a full set of priest robes, that has a high lapse value, both in terms of income and merits,” a priest says.

The church has constructed during slightest 800 sets of robes, with some-more in prolongation stages.

Each set sells for between 2,000 baht ($85.36) and 5,000 baht ($213.41), to keep appropriation a plan and compensate waste-sorting volunteers, many of whom are internal housewives, retirees and infirm persons.

Thailand is a fifth tip writer of cosmetic to a world’s oceans, according to a news by a U.S.-based organisation Ocean Conservancy. The list includes 3 other Southeast Asian countries and China, a tip plastics polluter.

“Not usually are a monks creation a petrify grant to recycling, though they are lifting recognition in their communities,” pronounced Chever Voltmer, Director for Plastics Initiatives during Ocean Conservancy.

When Phra Maha Pranom ventures into a community, villagers, both immature and old, come out to minister plastics.

“If we don’t collect these plastics, where do they finish up? In a stomachs of dugongs, dolphins, whales, and many other sea animals. Then they die,” he tells them.

Article source: https://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/bottles-to-robes-1.5454486?cmp=rss