Cuba, "Devuelta", a glass recycling project born in the heart of Havana

teleSUR English

teleSUR correspondent Belen de los Santos reports on Devuelta, a small private enterprise that recycles discarded glass to create new products for commercial and social use, tapping into the culture of recycling that takes root in Havana, Cuba. teleSUR

Transcript

00:00We're here in Havana, Cuba. Behind me is The Malecon, maybe one of the best-known

00:17places in the Cuban capital, but today we want to take you to other places of

00:21the city, places that are less well-known but where neighbors day-to-day are

00:27working in a collaborative effort, always thinking in the best for their

00:31communities. In this case we went to El Cerro, that is about seven to eight

00:36kilometers south from here. In there, Annie Becks, in her house, in her workshops,

00:41she is leading her own revolution, a revolution against consumerism and waste

00:47society that is hurting our world so much. Today, in the Cuban way, De Vuelta.

00:54De Vuelta is Spanish for coming back around, rediscovering what had been

01:00discarded. This is the name of the glass recycling project born in El Cerro, a

01:06neighborhood in the south of Havana, led by Annie Becks. Nurse, actress and creator,

01:11her interest in creating environmental awareness in her community dates back to

01:16her childhood. Since I was a child, I used to look for bottles. My job at the

01:23Revolution Defense Committee was to recover raw material and I used to go

01:27around with a card knocking on doors so that the bottles wouldn't be thrown away

01:31to recover them. My love for that, for recycling, for the environment, has always

01:36been there. It is a concern of mine and a latent commitment. The project began in the

01:45year 2021, after the COVID-19 pandemic revealed the harshest face of a world in

01:50crisis. Since then, De Vuelta seeks to educate about the concrete impact that our

01:56actions have on the planet. In its creative recycling workshops, children and adults

02:02learn to transform bottles rescued from the trash into new treasures. And when they

02:07finish, they are ready to continue replicating the experience in their

02:11communities. What I was most excited about was to come and learn this technique and

02:17then go back home and be able to give a new life and a new form to everything we have

02:20collected. I also want to integrate it to the construction of my house, which is really

02:28the objective I am looking for. I want to make skylights with bottles in the areas

02:33we are building right now and also to transmit the idea to people who might be interested. That

02:39you don't have to look for one of these nice skylights from the store. That you

02:43can make them in a very practical way with bottles.

02:46Through creative contact with the material, De Vuelta pursues a deeper goal. To demonstrate

02:55that consumerism and throw away mentality from capitalism is the cause of the serious

03:01environmental crisis that the planet is going through.

03:05Normally, we see the culture, the culture of consumerism. Let's put it that way, where

03:11something is no longer useful. It has lost its use, supposedly, and it's gone. But those

03:17things can be transformed into something else. You can give them another use and you feel it

03:22a little more yours. When you start to see everything that can be done with glass, you have a little

03:27more respect when it comes to throw it away or not.

03:34It is a rebellion against consumer society, which is what is largely destroying the planet.

03:43Behind each glass, behind each recycled cup, there is a collective effort. And for Annievex,

03:49at the end of the day, what matters most is the power of joining efforts in the face of adversity.

03:55Glass is a pretext to do something together. To transform something that was no longer useful,

04:04no longer functional. And make it work. I emphasize this a lot in my workshops. Unity. The importance

04:16of coming together, of doing something together. To care about what you are doing and getting

04:21involved to help you do it better. So I am constantly promoting this. The importance

04:29of uniting, of standing together. Because separated, we are not going anywhere.

04:36Brian De Los Santos, Denise Aravique, Furthermore, from Havana, Cuba.

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