Indigenous communities receive refurbished technology through local partnership

A local partnership aims to sendrefurbished technology to rural Indigenous communities in Canada while keeping electronics out of landfills.

Greentec is an e-waste recycling company based out of Cambridge, Ont. It will be donating the refurbished electronics to Makhos Solutions Inc.,an Indigenous-led company based in Neyaashiinigmiing near Wiarton, that aims to help Indigenous people obtain meaningful and sustainable employment.

The devices will go to various First Nations communities across the country.

Nicholas Saunders, Indigenous director of Makhos,said the technology will help students in particular,"especially in remote communities where a lot of kids still have to leave their community just to go to high school and then they fly home at the end of the week."

The partnership is approaching its one-year anniversary and many rural communities have already benefited,Tony Perrotta, founder and president of Greentec, told CBC News.

"There's a community in Curve Lake and the Nawash community was looking for some smart boards and laptops to help with learning. So we made several donations to help them get the technology they needed,"Perrotta said.

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A local partnership between an Indigenous-led staffing company and a management team dedicated to technology lifecycle will help marginalized communities thrive while keeping harmful batteries out of landfills.

Environmental benefits

The initiative also has a positive impact on the environment.

Electronics contain batteries and hazardous materials. Recycling them prevents those materials from ending up in landfills, reducing carbon and climate change, Perrotta said.

"We are stewards of the land and we need to remember that we're here borrowing from the next generation, " Saunders said. "If we can take one electronic out of a landfill and put it into new products or into repurposing so that somebody else has use of that, we are making sure that we are taking care of Mother Earth for future generations."

Anyone hoping to help with the partnership can contact Greentec through their website.

Saunders saidwhat one person might see as a simple donation can be life changing in these communities.

"If you can donate a laptop to an Indigenous person and they succeed, we at Makhos have succeeded in making sure that we're trying to take down as many barriers as we can for First Nations folks," he said.