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One man's rubbish is another man's treasure!

June 3 - 9, 2009
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WHAT do you do with a half used pack of Pampers once Junior's finally potty trained or those irritating little packs of free toiletries that you never use but can't quite bring yourself to throw away?

Nobody's going to buy that sort of stuff, but it seems an almost criminal waste to just bin it.

Now, Bahrain has an alternative solution with the launch of a local group of Freecycle.

It's the ultimate in environmental friendliness and allows members to simply give away the things they no longer want or need, rather than sending them to landfill.

Freecycle was first established in Tucson, Arizona, USA, in May 2003 to promote waste reduction in the city's downtown area and save the desert landscape from being taken over by sites for dumping garbage.

A completely non-profit organisation, since then Freecycle has spread around the globe and now has 3,500 local groups in 70 countries with millions of members.

Filipina Jemimah Abesamis, 25, from Juffair, decided to establish a Bahrain group after seeing the success of the operation in Manila of which she has been a long-time member.

She said: "I am a member of Freecycle Manila and know how much it helps the people there. The movement there is really big with a lot of members and is still growing.

"I knew that, if it can happen in Manila it can happen anywhere, especially here in Bahrain because there are so many expats at so many levels - some who have a lot of things to give and others who need those things.

"We only have a few members so far but it is building slowly and we already have some good offers of things like baby clothes and shoes - things that people would not necessarily sell but that they are happy to give away to others who need them."

Freecycle membership is free and open to everyone. All you have to do is go to www.freecycle.org choose the appropriate region and find the group for Bahrain, which is Freecycle Juffair.

Members can then post the items they want to give away and recipients arrange to come and collect them.

It's also possible to post wanted requests if you are looking for a particular item and Britain's BBC recently told the story of a bride who even managed to source everything from a wedding dress to bridal favours through Freecycle.







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