This morning at the Environmental Information and Education Centre of the Environmental Technologies Park of Mallorca, the closing ceremony of the waste management operator course took place. This event was attended by the Vice President of the Consell de Mallorca and Minister of Sustainability and Environment, Aurora Ribot; the general director of Fundació Deixalles, Francesca Martí; Gemma Arroyo of Ecoembalajes España (Ecoembes); the coordinator of the Incorpora en las Illes Balears program of the Fundació La Caixa, Juan Pablo Serrano; and the general director of TIRME, Rafael Guinea. During the ceremony, the students were presented with the certificates that accredit their training as waste management operators.

This training action is included in the 'Recycling to Change Lives' program, an initiative aimed at the labor insertion of people in vulnerable situations, with the aim of improving their employability and promoting their hiring in the recycling sector. It is a collaborative project between Ecoembes and the Incorpora program of 'La Caixa', through which its network of insertion technicians is made available to the initiative, including training to improve their employability.

The Deixalles Foundation and TIRME have been part of the 'Recycling to Change Lives' program since its inception in 2017. The results of these years of collaboration in the program with the Fundació La Caixa and Ecoembes are spectacular. During the four editions of the waste operator course, 66 students have attended it, with 865 hours of training, 52 of those students did internships in the company and 36 were reintegrated into the workforce. In this edition, 13 of the 15 students who started it have finished the course, the other two students left the course since they were inserted before finishing it.

The collaboration between Fundació Deixalles and TIRME in the field of social reintegration dates back to 2002. The results of this long collaboration have allowed the incorporation into the labor market of around 1,100 people. Currently, they work in the facilities of the public service of the Consell de Mallorca that manages TIRME about thirty people from the Fundació Deixalles. The workers who join the Fundació Deixalles carry out waste treatment activities in the packaging selection plant.

During this course, which has had a theoretical and a practical part in the TIRME facilities, the students have acquired knowledge in the field of municipal and industrial waste management: collection, treatment, prevention of occupational risks, ...

At the time of the delivery of the certificates accrediting the completion of the course, Iván and Carina, two of the people who have done it, thanked, on behalf of the rest of the students, all the organizations and institutions promoting the course, the possibility of being able to do it and thus have a new opportunity for them and all their classmates.

During the event, Rafael Guinea highlighted the excellent results in terms of social reintegration thanks to the collaboration with Fundació Deixalles during the last 20 years and recognized the effort and dedication of the students. Francesca Martí highlighted the importance of training to improve the skills of people with difficulties for insertion and thanked all the participating entities for the support given to this training. For her part, Gemma Arroyo, from Ecoembes, wanted to thank all the entities that have opted to join this project that is a generator of opportunities, thanked the effort of the students and stressed that Ecoembes is involved in the project since 2014. From the Fundació La Caixa, Juan Pablo Serrano commented on the importance of promoting programs such as 'Recycling to Change Lives'. Finally, at the closing of the event, Aurora Ribot, Vice-President of the Consell de Mallorca and Minister of Sustainability and Environment, highlighted the double importance of a waste management course like this: for its transformative capacity and social reintegration and for the urgency of training more people in the correct management of waste to promote the circular economy. He also thanked the students and associations for understanding waste not as a problem, but as an opportunity.