The tech startup tackling Rome’s rubbish problem

Italy’s capital, Rome, is utterly ridden with rubbish. There is so much of it that wild boars now come in from the countryside to pick through it. There used to be a landfill called Malagrotta, run by a local tycoon known as the ‘King of Trash’, which accepted the city’s 1.7m metric tonnes of annual waste, but the European Union closed it down in 2013.

The only disposal service that exists often leaves Rome’s rubbish festering for weeks on end. This remained unchallenged because it had strong affiliations with the Mafia. Successive mayors have pledged reforms but very little has been achieved.

Gian Luca Vorraro has founded the tech startup Borsino Rifiuti in order to tackle this longstanding problem. He has built an online marketplace which removes rubbish from households and delivers it to recycling centres, incinerators and landfill – a kind of Amazon or Uber for rubbish.

 

 

Borsino Rifiuti means ‘Little Garbage Exchange’ and its goal is to develop a ‘circular economy’ where buyers and sellers of waste products are matched. It also offers ‘Borsino Points’ which can be traded for on-demand rubbish collection.

Vorraro says all of this is cheaper and more effective than the public alternative for Romans who feel as if they are wasting money on rubbish collection taxes. The failed public system can be entirely replaced by Borsini Rifuti, says Vorraro.

Launched via crowdfund in 2017, Borsino Rifuti is thriving. Vorraro says the company, which has 12 full time employees and over 100 freelance deliver men, has already processed 2,500 tonnes of rubbish and distributed it to any of its 600 waste treatment plants.

In October, Rome finally issued a decree permitting small businesses to outsource their waste disposal to companies like Borsino Rifuti and Vorraro is optimistic that the company will triple its revenue next year.