JEDDAH, 24 May 2008 — Today, there is an increasing need to wisely utilize our resources. One of the greatest challenges that we face is maintaining or improving that environmental base.
Recycling is a key component in maintaining or improving the local environment. Not only does recycling make good economic sense, but it also demonstrates to the guests and the community a sense of good ethics.
Recycling is one element in the process of addressing the growing problem of municipal solid waste. Recycling means valuable materials that would otherwise be discarded are collected, remanufactured and reused. The idea of resource recovery and reuse is a key element in the modern concept of sustainable development.
While such measures can be taken at various levels, such as factories, offices and even homes, the hospitality industry worldwide is not lagging behind in recycling used products and disposables. A local hotel has done it.
Sheraton Jeddah Hotel has set the ball rolling locally with its recent introduction of a recycling scheme where all reusable materials including plastic, aluminum, glass, paper and wood coming from the guestrooms, food and beverage outlets and other areas are being collected at specially built recycling stations.
“I am not aware of any other local hotel doing this so this is the first of its kind here,” Edwin Wijkhuys, general manager of Sheraton Jeddah Hotel, told Arab News. “It was easy to set up the collection stations in the hotel with the staff in various departments separating the materials at source and then giving to a local company for recycling. Ironically, it was more difficult for us to identify this company at first, but now they collect the materials and sell them to be reused,” he said.
“The company gives us a share of the money, which we give to charity,” he added. Apart from the environmental factor, our recycling has also reduced the number of containers of garbage that we send out — about nearly seven containers a month, he said. “It also impacts on the cost and we are doing our bit for the cause,” he said.
The hotel organized the recycling launch with a showing of the movie “An Inconvenient Truth.” After the movie, Wijkhuys and Hotel Chief Engineer Mohamad Sarwar formally inaugurated the recycling stations.
“While recycling may still be unknown in Saudi Arabia, the effects of global warming and a deteriorating environment are only too obvious both in Jeddah and in the home countries of many of the hotel associates,” Wijkhuys said, adding that after the implementation of the waste water treatment and reuse of waste water in the hotel gardens, this was the second major environmental initiative taken by the hotel.
