A clean start for sustainable soap
Most of us avoid making eye contact with our fellow plane passengers. We certainly wouldn’t consider talking to any of them. Luckily for millions of people around the world, Soap Aid founder Michael Matulick is different.
When he struck up a conversation with epidemiology professor Martyn Jeggo on a flight in 2012, they discovered a way to solve 2 global problems, potentially saving millions of lives while also diverting waste from landfill.
Over 2 million children die every year from hygiene-related diseases like influenza and diarrhoea. At the same time, Australian accommodation providers send around 5 million of bars of lightly-used soap to landfill annually, generating methane and contributing to global warming.
More than a decade after Michael’s fateful flight, Soap Aid has recycled and distributed almost 3 million bars of soap, preventing illness and death around the world and diverting around 300 tonnes of waste from landfill.
It is the only Australian charity currently undertaking this humanitarian and environmental service with recycled soap.
Soap Aid’s Carol Bellew says recycled soap is just as clean as its brand-new counterpart, thanks to a rigorous process where the soap is carefully sorted, scraped of debris and filtered before being crushed, heated and turned into hygienically-tested new bars.
“Soap has a high pH, which makes it naturally antibacterial. We’ve tested our recycled product and it’s pristine. It’s just as good as a bar of soap on the supermarket shelf."
As well as being recyclable, bar soap is more eco-friendly and cost-effective than liquid soap.
Carol says accommodation providers can reduce their in-room plastic by up to 25% just by using bar soap in their guest bathrooms instead of liquid soap.
“There’s a place for liquid soap in public toilets where many people are using the facilities over the course of the day,” Carol says.
“But in accommodation, a hard soap bar is more hygienic than liquid soap as the guest gets a brand-new bar, while the soap dispensers must be cleaned and sanitised,” Carol says.
Through its community partners, Soap Aid has been distributing soap all over the world, including over 1 million bars to Cambodia.
According to Eco-Soap Bank Cambodia, families are often forced to choose between their hygiene and their next meal, meaning donations from Soap Aid are vital.
“Cambodia is in a critical situation with one of the poorest healthcare infrastructures in the world. This makes soap bars even more important as an agent of preventative measures against all infectious diseases,” says Eco-Soap Bank Cambodia.
Closer to home, the Nganampa Health Council says soap distributed across the Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara Lands has helped combat COVID-19, shigella and trachoma. Australia remains the only developed nation where trachoma persists as a public health issue, causing irreversible blindness.
“The provision of soap to as many of the community members as possible, combined with the public health messaging around hand-washing, has and continues to be an essential platform in our fight against disease,” says Nganampa Health Council.
Carol says Soap Aid also sends soap to natural disasters and is open to giving soap to almost any hygiene or health program, with a particular focus on children.
“If you’ve got a 5-year-old child in primary school getting a bar of soap, they’ll take it home and want to make sure everyone’s using it,” Carol says.
“That behaviour change gets pushed up from the young child and starts to take effect across the whole family.”
Funding from Sustainability Victoria is helping Soap Aid to re-establish their recycling plant in Melbourne’s south-east and expand its hygiene education program.
As a result, Soap Aid will be able to distribute 150,000 new bars of soap to around 20,000 vulnerable Victorians over the next 18 months, while also lowering carbon emissions by 59 per cent, preventing 21.8 tonnes of greenhouse gases entering the earth’s atmosphere and reducing the use of raw materials.
Carol says the funding has been crucial to Soap Aid, particularly after the coronavirus pandemic.
“When the tourism industry shut down over COVID-19, it was really tough for us,” Carol says.
“Part of what we’re doing with Sustainability Victoria is trying to bring some of those hotels back on board and reinvigorate our membership base.
“The funding has been a game-changer for us. We wouldn’t have been able to set up our plant again without it.”
Learn more about Soap Aid or register your hotel for soap donation.
Soap Aid is a finalist in the Premier’s Sustainability Awards. The winners will be announced on 23 November 2023.