The Foundation is based in Taiwan but has offices all over the world. Tzu Chi’s missions focus on giving material aid to the needy and inspiring love and humanity to both givers and receivers. In addition to charity, the foundation dedicates itself in the fields of medicine, education, environmental protection and international relief work. It also promotes humanistic values and community volunteerism.

Tzu Chi’s recycling work is indeed impressive. Taiwan today is the champion in recycling of plastic bottles. As compared to a global statistics of 25 per cent, Taiwan recycles 90 per cent of their PET bottles thanks to the efforts by the Tzu Chi Foundation.

It was in the year 2003 when Master Cheng Yen, the founder of Tzu Chi Foundation, encouraged a group of volunteers to research and develop food, clothing, housing, transportation, information and communication products which can be used in international relief missions. Thus began the Tzu Chi International Humanitarian Aid Association (TIHAA) in November 2003. Since then, many Tzu Chi volunteers have joined in the environment protection movement. Besides actively promoting and engaging in recycling and sorting recyclables, the volunteers also apply the concept of environmental protection in their daily lives.

Worried about the impact of non-biodegradable plastic bottles on the ecology of the earth, in 2006 TIHAA started to gather vendors to set up assembly lines, using the recycled plastic bottles that the Tzu Chi volunteers collected in order to produce eco-friendly textile products such as blankets. As of today, these blankets have been distributed to people in need during winters, distributions and disaster relief missions around the world, benefiting more than 600,000 people.

In 2008, with selfless kindness in their heart and the concept of ‘Coexist with the Earth’ in their mind, five TIHAA volunteer entrepreneurs set up a company named DA.AI Technology Co. Ltd. to develop technology used to produce all kinds of clothes, blankets and daily use textile from recycled plastic bottles collected by Tzu Chi volunteers. In 2010, these five entrepreneurs donated 100 per cent of DA.AI’s stock ownership to the Tzu Chi Foundation, making DA.AI a unique socially responsible business.

DA.AI was established due to the inspiration and encouragement from Dharma Master Cheng Yen, who encouraged these entrepreneurs to gather more people to apply their professional expertise in researching and developing technology used for producing eco-products, thereby benefiting people across the world. Thus, with their professional expertise and selfless loving heart, these entrepreneurs joined hands in applying the concepts of environmental protection and charity in the development and production of eco-products.

The eco brand, DA.AI, originates from Taiwan and looks out to the world with a global perspective. With a core mission of providing eco-friendly fashion products, the company adheres to the standard of keeping its product sources, from raw materials to manufacturing 100 per cent eco-friendly. The company’s recycled polyester, made from post-consumer PET bottles, saves about 66 per cent of energy consumption, and reduces carbon emissions with about 33 per cent, compared to using virgin materials.

The company is Taiwan’s first non-profit company dedicated to producing eco-friendly products and one of the world’s first non-profit companies which donates 100 per cent of its net proceeds to charity. DA.AI adheres to Master Cheng Yen’s concept of ‘Coexist with the Earth’ by integrating Tzu Chi recycling volunteers’ efforts and manufacturers’ eco-friendly production concept, and using recycled resources as raw materials to manufacture eco-friendly products. This process not only activates a new life cycle for used PET bottles, at also reduces the consumption of new resources, solving the myriad problems associated with Taiwan’s massive volume of plastic recyclables.

In addition to the development of eco-friendly apparel and everyday life products made from recycled fabrics, DA.AI is also a pioneer in integrating environmental protection and charitable work by turning recycled PET bottles into warm fleece blankets. Through Tzu Chi volunteers’ efforts, DA.AI has distributed over 450,000 eco-friendly blankets to people suffering from natural disasters in over 26 countries. These blankets reflect the concept of ‘extending an article’s life and creating blessings and wisdom’.

Since it was established, DA.AI continues to develop new eco-products and further increase the quality of its recycled polyester fibers. It also collaborates with supply chain vendors from the textile industry to develop new functions for eco-fabrics, such as ventilation and moisture absorption, cooling and heating and odour removal, and develop qualities such as anti-static, water resistance and anti-radiation, etc. With ‘Eco Concepts and Green Living’ as the theme, DA.AI plans to present a complete series of eco-friendly textile products and deliver the message of protecting the earth through recycling resources and reducing carbon emissions. DA.AI hopes to encourage and inspire more people to work towards conserving resources and reducing global warming.

Recycling has yet to gain widespread popularity in India, though we have it inbuilt in us. Indians as a tribe are not waste creators. It is only the recent trend of blind emulation of the West and consumerism that has created this monster of plastic waste. Globalisation has flooded Indian cities with packaging that is theoretically recyclable but is not, in practice, recycled. PET bottles for soft drinks and mineral water are the biggest problem, as they end up in sewers and block surface and underground drains, causing flooding in low-lying areas and enormous economic loss annually, especially to the poorest in society who normally live in the worst affected areas. The United States and the European Union have stringent laws for take-back of such wastes, so they dump their PET waste almost free in India for recycling.

India launched ‘Ecomark’ as a voluntary eco-labelling scheme from 1992 onwards for up to 14 industry categories to encourage industry to adopt eco-friendly production methods and consumers to pursue sustainable consumption patterns. Unfortunately, not a single Indian or foreign industry has ‘volunteered’ to sign up, for two reasons. Firstly, there is no deadline for compliance. Secondly, the Ecomark is administered by the BIS which is a notoriously bureaucratic arrangement that no industry wants, and they charge for their services on the basis of per item sold, which can become excessive for bulk items.

Streamlining and reformation of the Ecomark procedure could bring about a revolution in the bio-polymers industry, which more readily fulfill the criteria set down by the Ecomark, and can enable grants to be facilitated more easily.

India urgently needs policy concepts and legal requirements like those in the EU countries and the US to prevent its cities from drowning in non-biodegradable waste. New legislation and market strategies in the Indian context could help promote product stewardship, producer responsibility and waste minimisation. Lessons and laws gleaned from similar legislations around the world, like those in the US and the EU could help India adopt waste minimisation and eco-friendly packaging, and thus revolutionise this industry.

We too need a Tzu Chi to take care of the plastic menace in India. Calling for a prototype of Tzu Chi! Is anyone listening? q