Fifteen CMI Environmental Science students spent exactly one hour collecting trash on the beach in the Uliga area of Majuro to study how much money they could earn with Majuro Atoll Waste Company’s new “Cash for Trash” program starting soon.
The program seeks to recycle plastic and glass bottles, as well as aluminum cans by awarding 5 cents for each one handed in to them.
The students collected 695 items and would have earned $34.75. On average, each student therefore earned $2.32 per hour; almost as much as the minimum wage in RMI.
“We have demonstrated that enterprising people can make the equivalent of a minimum wage job by cleaning up the environment,” said CMI Professor Michael Honeth, who led the experiment.
Read more about this in the July 20, 2018 edition of the Marshall Islands Journal.