Incentives for Plastic Recycling: How to Engage Citizens in Active Collection. Empirical Evidence from Spain

The recycling target for plastics is expected to increase Europe-wide from 22.5% to 55% by 2025, hence the relevance of incentive schemes and the need to reach conclusions about how to encourage families to recycle more. Following this objective, a pilot project was implemented and a virtual reward...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores: Gibovic, Denisa, Bikfalvi, Andrea
Tipo de recurso: artículo
Estado:Versión publicada
Fecha de publicación:2021
País:España
Institución:Varias* (Consorci de Biblioteques Universitáries de Catalunya, Centre de Serveis Científics i Acadèmics de Catalunya)
Repositorio:Recercat. Dipósit de la Recerca de Catalunya
OAI Identifier:oai:recercat.cat:10256/19603
Acceso en línea:http://hdl.handle.net/10256/19603
Access Level:acceso abierto
Palabra clave:Plàstics -- Reciclatge
Plastics -- Recycling
Residus -- Eliminació
Refuse and refuse disposal
Descripción
Sumario:The recycling target for plastics is expected to increase Europe-wide from 22.5% to 55% by 2025, hence the relevance of incentive schemes and the need to reach conclusions about how to encourage families to recycle more. Following this objective, a pilot project was implemented and a virtual reward token called RECICLOS created to encourage recycling among families, using incentives and awards to improve recycling behaviour and a webapp prototype to register the recycled plastic. By the end of the 6-week pilot project, 1053 families were registered on the scheme, representing 10% of the targeted population in the pilot area of the county of Pla de l’Estany, Catalonia, Spain. The novelties were the introduction of a token, the gamification of incentives through raffles and lotteries, webapp-based direct communication with citizens, and feedback after collecting and registering the recycled material. The multidimensional aspects of recycling activities, their strong relation with human behavioural patterns, and the high demand for communication and interaction mean that mobile technologies find significant application in this field. The results show that people can be influenced and their recycling habits changed by means of varied, effective, and innovative incentive schemes