Putting waste to good use
Business Times 28 Apr 10;
Reclaims Enterprise has plans to recycle organic waste into animal feed and fertilisers, reports EILEEN TAY
RECYCLING company Reclaims Enterprise is playing its part to battle the shortage of dumping grounds in Singapore by recycling industrial waste into construction materials and animal feed.
Started in January 2009, the young company was born among four long-time friends with a common vision: to reduce wastage in Singapore. It was their many years of experience in the construction industry that made them realise that a large portion of construction waste could be recycled into materials that could be used for further construction.
This observation led Reclaims Enterprise to focus on recycling construction waste into usable road materials in the first stage of its venture into the recycling industry.
When asked how well his company is faring, Tan Kok Huat, managing director of Reclaims Enterprise, modestly says 'fairly well', estimating a turnover of about $2 million last financial year.Despite the positive outlook of the business, Mr Tan expresses fears that growth may be restricted in the near future because of regulatory barriers with regard to the use of recycled materials as construction materials.
For instance, although he says recycled stones produced by the company can provide roads with the level of sturdiness required by the Land Transport Authority (LTA), it has not been officially approved for such use. Thus, Reclaims Enterprise is supplying only to private firms, where owners have the say in the choice of materials used.
On the bright side, this two-year-old problem may soon be resolved as there are currently bigger companies pushing for LTA's certification.
Though recycling waste into construction materials has helped to anchor Reclaims Enterprise in the recycling industry, it is not what differentiates Reclaims Enterprise from other recycling companies. What enables the company to stand out is its plans to recycle organic waste into animal feed and fertilisers.
To convert waste into animal feed and fertilisers, Reclaims Enterprise gets factories' organic waste, such as biscuits, bread and milk waste, removes the moisture in it using high temperatures, and then grinds it into powder.
The technology used for this process is termed Environmental Recycling System (ERS) and is imported from Japan. In the first few months of usage, Reclaims Enterprise engaged experts from Japan to come to Singapore to train workers to operate the machines.
Using its newly-imported machines, Reclaims Enterprise is able to reduce moisture content in the resultant product to less than 10 per cent compared to the usual 20 per cent that other recycling companies in the industry can do. A lower moisture content means that the product can last longer.
Reclaims Enterprise has four of these machines situated in Tuas and each of them can process about 60 tonnes of waste. As moisture makes up about 88 per cent of the waste processed, after processing the waste through the machines, only a quarter of the 240 tonnes can be used as animal feed and fertilisers.
'Rather than having companies incinerate their waste, we can recycle it to something more useful,' says Mr Tan in Mandarin, commenting on Singapore's recyclable waste of about 2,000 tonnes daily.
He goes on to enthuse that we can use our country's resources instead of relying on foreign countries. Currently, local farms import their feed and fertilisers from overseas.
The idea of recycling waste to produce animal feed and fertilisers was proposed last year when the management team saw the potential in this business.
'As the population increases, consumption increases and thus, the amount of waste available for recycling also increases,' explains Mr Tan.
Reclaims Enterprise is currently testing the feasibility of the entire process with a sample machine, and so far results have been positive. Mr Tan believes that in six more months, the company can start supplying animal feed to local farms. Claiming that finding buyers is not difficult, Mr Tan says that Reclaims Enterprise has already engaged two potential clients.
Nevertheless, Reclaims Enterprise is still a small-scale company. The company does not have an office of its own yet, and is currently using the quarters of Mr Tan's current construction company as office space. Also, apart from the four founders of the company, the company only employs 10 staff, all whom are stationed at Tuas.
Mr Tan and his management team do not have the privilege of giving orders from the comfort of an office. Instead, they make the long trip to Tuas every day to give personal training and supervision to their workers.
When asked how his management team manages the workers, Mr Tan simply says that productivity is observable from the amount that is produced at the end of the day.
Mr Tan says that the potential prize money that the company may garner from being a winner of the Emerging Enterprise 2010 will be used to upscale the company.
In the next three to five years, if there are substantial returns from this business, Reclaims Enterprise aims to increase its number of machines by two, so as to handle more waste. Mr Tan states that currently, the amount that the company can produce is possibly only enough to supply to one client if the client is a big company.
To ensure enough manpower to operate more machines, the company also aims to double its number of staff to 20.
The company is also considering expanding into neighbouring countries. Mr Tan observes that countries such as Malaysia and Indonesia have many farms and are potential markets for recycled animal feed and fertilisers.
Despite being shortlisted for the Emerging Enterprise 2010, Mr Tan is not one to trumpet his successes. 'I don't like to glorify our company's achievements, especially when we have yet to succeed. I will be happy as long as we manage to get our new idea of recycling waste into animal feed rolling.'
