St Francis School Xaghra wins 7th edition of Batterina Campaign

by Gozo News · October 15, 2016

The Minister for Sustainable Development, Environment and Climate Change José Herrera and the Minister for Gozo Anton Refalo, addressed a ceremony at St. Francis School, Xaghra, Gozo, for the annual Wasteserv school competition – the Battery Buster campaign, better known as Batterina.

St Francis School Xaghra – is the winning school of the Battery Buster Campaign 2015 – 2016. This school collected an average of 6.021kgs of spent batteries per capita.

The school won € 2,500 in cash to be used for educational purposes, a project related to the environment or as an investment in school resources. St Francis School Xaghra wins 7th edition of Batterina Since the beginning of the Batterina campaign in 2009 more than 52,000 kilos of used batteries have been collected from schools in Gozo and Malta. In the latest edition for the school year 2015-2016, more than 6,100 kilos of batteries were collected from schools, with 179 schools having taken part.

Minister Herrera also announced that the batteries collection service will no longer fall under the remit of Wasteserv, but will move to the private sector in 2017.

The Minister thanked Wasteserv for its valuable work over recent years in the field of collecting batteries, and explained that the change to the private sector is an important step in the management of waste in our country.

Minister Refalo said that eighteen percent of the collected batteries in this 7th edition came from schools in Gozo. He thanked the Gozitan students for their participation, saying that this is the second consecutive year in which a school from Gozo has collected the largest amount of used batteries per capita. St Francis School Xaghra wins 7th edition of Batterina Speaking during the ceremony, the CEO of Wasteserv, Tonio Montebello, announced that the campaign will continue until December 2016, with the eighth and final edition.

He stressed the importance of also separating recyclable waste, such as plastic, paper, cardboard, metal and glass, both at home and school. "This waste that we have separated arrives at Wasteserv, and from that time it ceases to be waste, but starts the process to become a resource."

St Francis School also produced an exhibition of items made from recycled materials.