Wild Coast Casino Reaches Zero Waste Status

Sun International’s Wild Coast property earned a fine feather in its cap after being awarded a Net Zero Waste rating by an environmental group. The Green Building Council of South Africa congratulated the popular land-based casino for its impressive recycling efforts, whereby it managed to go from 40 tons of waste to none. .

The Wild Coast Sun resort has been waste-free since 2016, however the GBCSA needed to monitor and verify the process for at least a year before awarding the certificate to the property. A professional environmental consultancy company was then called in to perform an external audit. Besides the proof of zero-waste on the property, the casino also had to show that its staff were educated about the long-term benefits of the project via workshops and seminars.

The overall mission of South Africa’s premier casino and hospitality group, Sun International is to eliminate waste that it sends to landfills. It also encourages its suppliers and contractors to do the same.

According to the Grocotts Mail, the Wild Coast Sun has recycled some 600 tons of waste each year since January 2017. This helps create jobs for the local community and also ensures that one of the most pristine coastlines in the world remains protected.

Some of the steps taken by Wild Coast Sun in its environmental efforts:
• Uses enterprise projects to collect and separate food waste, cartridges, paper, cardboard and batteries.
• Produces compost from food waste and garden cuttings.
• Grows organic vegetable gardens.
• Saves tens of thousands each month by using its own organic vegetables for its hotel and restaurants.
• Donates excess vegetables to local soup kitchens.
• Material waste (eg. beds, hotel furniture, etc) is donated to local communities and charities.
• Most plastic waste is recycled.

“Our approach to sustainability is holistic,” noted Wild Coast Sun’s safety, health and environmental officer, Sonja Stroud. “It is based on the need to protect our natural environment and to save our natural resources, so eliminating the waste we send to landfill is a natural progression of this strategy. To achieve our zero waste goal we had to scrutinise every element of our operation at the Wild Coast. The first step was to get rid of skips and compactors and to sort the waste on site. Now, recycling and repurposing waste lessens our environmental footprint and also assists people living in the communities we do business in through donations of physical products, excess food from our gardens and the creation of new business and employment opportunities.”