Camara receives 100,000th computer for recycling

Life

PIctured: A student at Mji Wa Salama Children's Home, Mombasa, Kenya, which has benefitted from Camara's work in donating PCs and training educators. Image: Tim Mansel

Camara Education has announced the receipt of its 100,000th computer for refurbishment.

Since 2005 Camara Education, the largest computer reuse organisation in Ireland, has erased the hard drives of 116,989 computers and shipped 54,395 refurbished computers to disadvantaged communities in 10 countries around the world to improve the quality of education.

Last year alone, over 176 tonnes of waste was accepted by Camara and 74 tonnes of IT equipment was prepared for reuse in schools and other educational institutes around the world. The charity accepts donations of IT equipment from organisations and individuals. Once the computer’s data is securely erased, it is evaluated for reuse. If the equipment is not deemed to be suitable for reuse it is sent to The Recycling Village, Camara’s local accredited Recycling partner.

More than 2,500 schools have received computers and over 12,000 educators have been trained to deliver IT courses. These educators have provided over 700,000 students from disadvantaged communities with digital literacy and other skills in Ireland and abroad.

Mark Fox, business development manager, Camara Education, said: “While this milestone is very encouraging, we know that there are hundreds of thousands of computers in Ireland that are not being reused. A lot of companies change their equipment every three years and generally the equipment is still fully functional.”

John Fitzsimons, CEO, Camara Education, said: “Energy is a finite resource. Reusing computing equipment is an excellent way to mitigate the negative environmental impact that is generated over the life cycle of a computer. Premature recycling results in the vast majority of resources that have gone into manufacturing being lost.”

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