The hard truth about what happens to your plastic after you throw it away.

In this episode of Swiss Impact, Ben and Sveta sit down with Violy, the co-founder of SIRSAK—the innovative winner of the Swiss Impact Spotlight Award. Based in Indonesia, where plastic waste often feels like an unstoppable tide, Violy and her team are tackling the hardest part of the crisis: low-value plastic.

 

From snack wrappers to coffee sachets, these materials are often ignored because they are difficult to recycle and hold no market value—until now. Violy shares her personal journey from a finance professional to a social entrepreneur after a life-changing visit to a landfill just five minutes from her home.

 

In this interview, we dive into:

• The Problem with "Invisible" Plastic: Why current systems fail when it comes to lightweight, multi-layered packaging.

• The Power of Data: How SIRSAK uses digitalization to track waste from a single household to a final recycled product, ensuring ethical supply chains.

• Social Impact: How SIRSAK provides social security and insurance to the "backbone" of the industry—the women and informal waste pickers often left behind.

• The Future of Circularity: Why recycling isn't the final answer, and how we must redesign our economy to include the cost of disposal from the start.

 

Join us for a deep dive into the heart of the waste crisis and the bold solutions being built on the ground in Jakarta and beyond.