A report on how to save the environment from plastic bottles and polythene bags in uganda

Several groups in Uganda are using plastic bottles to build houses and other buildings.

Uganda does not have a strong recycling system, and plastic bottles are often thrown on the street or end up in the sewer. Sometimes they're even burned, which is bad for people's health and the environment.

In one of the slums in Kampala, the capital of Uganda, Patrick Mujuzi is working to both create jobs and clean the slum. He hired 400 people to build a public toilet using 15,000 plastic bottles, which took a month.

Mujuzi pays people to fill old bottles with plastic bags found in the slums. Once the bottles are put in place, the spaces between them are filled with mortar.

Mujuzi said that building with this plastic is actually stronger than using bricks, since the bottles aren't affected by rain or sunshine. It takes just a few minutes to make a bottle brick, while making soil bricks can take weeks.

Elsewhere in Uganda, the Social Innovation Academy (SINA) helps poor young people and refugees learn skills and start their own small businesses. More than 75% of people in Uganda are under 30, but 13% of young people don't have jobs. The country is also home to 1.3 million refugees.

In one SINA project, David Miiro has been teaching young people how to build plastic bottle houses. "You fill them with soil, because soil is everywhere," he told AJ Plus. "You pack it, you start constructing without any cost." One house can use as many as 18,000 bottles.

Miiro said that using bottles is better for the environment because builders don't have to burn wood to make bricks. Travelers can even stay in some of the SINA houses and see the work the group does, renting through SINA or Airbnb.

let's try these innovative methods and save the environment for the present and future generation 

By Isiko Aggrey 

Ambassador uganda