Forto launches Ocean Plastic Prevention with Plastic Fischer

Forto, the leading European digital freight forwarder, launches today the first commercially available product to help shippers reduce the amount of plastic landing in the ocean. Created in partnership with Plastic Fischer, an award-winning organisation specialising in plastic waste recovery and recycling, Forto’s new product Ocean Plastic Prevention offers businesses a unique opportunity to contribute to cleaner oceans.

Clean rivers, save oceans

There are 5,25 trillion pieces of plastic waste in the ocean with 5000,000 tons of plastic being added every year and no global agreement to reduce plastic waste. If current trends continue, the amount of plastic entering the oceans is set to double in the next ten years.

Close to 700 marine species are now known to be harmed by plastic, of which more than 100 are endangered. Its economic impact on coastal communities is estimated to be up to 19 billion USD per year. Plastics are, indeed, magnets for toxic chemicals, which, when consumed by the fish that gets eaten, potentially impacts the health of the three billion people who rely on seafood as their primary source of protein.

The majority of ocean plastic spills out from rivers with 1% of rivers being responsible for 80% of plastic in the oceans. Intercepting plastic in rivers is much more cost-effective than dealing with the consequences downstream.

Pay for plastic to be picked up from the most polluted river in the world

Ocean Plastic Prevention enables companies to purchase plastic credits, which represent the amount of plastic that Plastic Fischer recovers and recycles from the Citarum river – one of the world’s most polluted rivers – close to the city of Bandung in Indonesia, which is the home of many of Forto’s customers’ factories.

Using the award-winning TrashBoom technology, Plastic Fischer has installed 10 systems in the Citarum river and has already stopped, collected and managed over 200 tons of river plastic.

Forto’s commitment: transparency & 1 + 1 matching scheme

Every kilogram of non-organic material collected is tracked with a tool provided by Empower.eco. Blockchain technology will ensure the tracking data cannot be changed and therefore will safeguard the process against corruption. At any given moment in time, it will be possible to know how much has been collected, sorted, stored, or has been sent for co-processing or recycling.

For each kilogram of prevented ocean plastic that a customer procures, Forto purchases 1 kilogram on top until the first 10,000 kilograms are achieved. The matching scheme runs until the first UN Sustainable Transport Day on November 26, 2023.

Going beyond transport emissions

Ocean Plastic Prevention is the first of Forto’s sustainability offerings to go beyond transport emissions and enables shippers to tackle pollution across the entire supply chain. With oceans’ key role in generating global oxygen and capturing excess global heat, Ocean Plastic Prevention is offering Forto’s customers an additional way to limit climate change and expands Forto’s existing product portfolio including offsetting, ocean biofuel and Sustainable Aviation Fuel offerings.

“Plastic pollution in our oceans is a serious problem that needs immediate attention,” said Achim Jüchter, Head of Sustainable Logistics Offering at Forto. “We believe that businesses have a significant role to play in protecting our planet. With our Ocean Plastic Prevention service, every shipment can contribute directly to reducing ocean plastic. It is easy to integrate with existing workflows and provides verified information about the quantity of plastic collected and offset, allowing companies to confidently communicate their sustainability efforts to stakeholders.”

“We are proud to be collaborating with Plastic Fischer on this initiative, whose strong record in plastic recovery and positive impact on the local economy has led us to choose them from a pool of 20 potential providers evaluated on 24 criteria. Together, and with our customers, we will contribute to stopping ocean plastic by cleaning rivers,” said Achim Jüchter, Head of Sustainable Logistics Offering at Forto.

Media contact
Adrianne Montgobert
[email protected]

About Forto
Forto advances the vision to deliver a highly transparent, frictionless, and sustainable digital supply chain. Forto platform technologies address the entire process stream, from offer, booking, document administration, tracking and tracing to pro-active exemption processing and analysis, supporting our customers with greater visibility, insight, and control. Leading manufacturers and e-commerce brands are among the 2.500 customers using Forto’s digitally-focused offerings as part of their supply chain delivery. Headquartered in Berlin, Germany, the company currently has around 900 employees with 8 countries and 21 locations across Europe (Germany, Italy, Poland, Spain, The Netherlands) and Asia (China, Singapore, Vietnam). For more information, please visit www.forto.com.

About Plastic Fischer

Plastic Fischer is the world’s first organisation to tackle Ocean Plastic Pollution already in rivers. Their simple TrashBoom technology can be built on site and is operated by local full-time employees. The startup has been awarded as “Top Innovator” by UpLink – the innovation platform of the World Economic Forum and is one of the leading companies to prevent marine plastic pollution. Besides stopping and managing the River Plastic, the social enterprise creates full-time employment for local people and provides them with safe jobs, regular working hours, fair pay and social benefits.