I am sometimes bothered about how some people package drinks like zobo, kunu, and likes. These homemade drinks are packaged with discarded bottles from coca-cola, bottled water containers and so on. One cannot tell if they were thoroughly washed or treated before use. All we do is buy and enjoy. Note that different people roam on most of these dirt heaps where these disposed of bottles are picked from and you cannot tell what could have happened to those containers. Aside from that, people with contagious diseases like tuberculosis, hepatitis, Lassa fever among others could have dropped one of those plastics. Some of these plastic bottles have urine contents inside of them thrown in dustbins, ash heaps or dunghills.

To make worse, some empty malt bottles have been used as chemical containers before being discarded. Most of the people that pick them do not care about the buyers’ health but their wealth. To sum it up, these bottles are not only used to package drinks but also to pack groundnuts, peanuts, groundnut oil, and others not mentioned. Also, places like parties, gutters, and hospital dustbins are not left out of where these discarded objects are been picked from.

Truth be told, I’ve seen a woman pick project papers from a waste bin at the school hostel, (you can imagine how female waste bins can be) and I wondered what she was going to do with those papers. Perhaps, to recycle and use them as painting supports. I am not sure of this but I know that most of these discarded papers are picked and sold out to those who use them to wrap roasted corns and plantains, groundnuts, beans cake, etc
These are the things many of us buy and eat. It is not out of place for us to be conscious and mindful of where we buy things, what and how those things are packaged.

Those who are into this business must ensure that thorough washing and treating of these bottles are done before use. Better still, empty containers can be bought to brand homemade drinks, project papers can be handed over to the sellers of the above-mentioned food by the owner instead of dumping them in the waste bin. Let already discarded containers and papers be recycled for artworks and not for packaging food, in other to save lives from diseases and food poisoning.

In conclusion, I give kudos to the scavengers who help in picking these objects, though they make money from it but still help in controlling waste in our environment.
By Omolola Funmilayo Ilesanmi