In just under two months, the first match of this year's EUROPEADA will kick off. Preparations are in full swing and the European Football Championship for Europe's indigenous national minorities is increasingly taking shape. Now another important step can be announced: The first medals for the players of the best teams in the tournament are ready! But these are not the typical ‘precious metals’ familiar from comparable sports competitions. The medals specially made for EUROPEADA 2024 are made from 100 per cent recycled plastic waste!
They are produced by the Danish environmental company STRANDET, which has set itself the task of ridding the sea – and our environment in general – of plastic waste. Together with volunteers, tourists and school classes, STRANDET regularly collects plastic waste from the coasts of Denmark and recycles some of the old plastic into new products. For example, the environmentally harmful waste is turned into key rings, cups, candle holders or even jewellery. Or into the medals for EUROPEADA 2024.
However, the plastic waste used to make these special awards does not come from just anywhere, but from the area around the Schusterkate/Skomagerhus border crossing between Germany and Denmark – after all, this year's EUROPEADA is also taking place in the German-Danish border region (motto: ‘Between the Seas’).
The waste was already collected there last autumn: under the slogan ‘Garbage for medals’, EUROPEADA enthusiasts from all over Europe, who had come together for a seminar as part of the Minority Competence Network of Schleswig-Holstein/South Denmark (MKN), started a waste collection campaign on the water in the surrounding area.
As a partner of EUROPEADA, STRANDET then set about producing the aforementioned medals from the collected plastic waste. The (manual) production is currently in full swing – and the first medals are ready! There will be 180 in total in the end – 60 gold, 60 silver and 60 bronze.
“We try to create products with a strong story and something that can show people that we can actually take pollution from the environment and turn it into something valuable”, says Jens Wilhelm Jørgensen, the owner of STRANDET, explaining his company's mission.
The medals recycled from plastic waste for EUROPEADA 2024 are a convincing testimony to this ambitious goal.
Photo: STRANDET
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