It was Help Up’s final cleanup for 2019 over the weekend, and they created a special award to thank those that supported them throughout the year.
Cape Town, South Africa – Help Up is an organisation that works to clean up problem areas that are littered or polluted by using pledges they receive from the public to pay people that need employment. The people are paid to work on these areas for a few hours. Help Up is managed by Georgia Mctaggart who gets stuck in with the people that help.
The organisation spent most of 2019 cleaning up the Black River in Cape Town. The organisation has flourished this year, with many joining the team to clean or sending through donations which are used to employ people to help keep the river clean.
Each weekend, they have shared updates about their progress. After cleaning, Help Up relied on the City of Cape Town’s Solid Waste team to collect all the litter and rubbish pulled from the river. To say thank you to the solid waste team, Help Up created an award made from recycled items.
“The Help Up Award for Service Excellence went to City of Cape Town Solid Waste Heroes this year. The award is made entirely out of discarded waste. The glove is stuffed with 2kg of soft plastic and the little blue bags were painstakingly put together and weathered by volunteers Reandra and Leo. The globe was found in the river 5 months ago and repainted to look like new.”
The award is beautiful, a real work of art and so surprising that its made from items collected from the river throughout the year.
Help Up did the final clean for the year but have confirmed that a small team will maintain the area until the new year. They collected over 70 tons of litter from the river in 2019
“That is 70 tons of waste that didn’t land up in the ocean this year. That is amazing! We wouldn’t have been able to achieve this if it weren’t for the support of our friends at the Solid Waste ops team led by Mr Gregory Whyte”
While on their break, the team are still raising funds which are used to employ people from the community. They require just R50.00 to pay a person for 2-hours work. Not nearly a massive amount but just enough to make an enormous difference.
If you would like to pledge towards their clean-ups, check the crowdfunding page out here or inbox them for the banking details via the Facebook page.
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