As estimation, about 1% of the country’s population is surviving from waste-recycling activity, which means more than 2 million people. In one hand, it allows high recycling rates for plastics, iron, cartons & paper, etc. In the other hand, the majority of wastes collectors called "Pemulung" lives in poor conditions.

Using hybrid model, Danone AQUA & Ashoka are putting their expertise together to develop market based strategies serving low income population, working with civil society organizations of leading Social Entrepreneurs. The "Pemulung Empowerment Program"-PEP- has been designed to propose innovative social business model aiming at improving the social and economic status of the waste pickers. Within 4 years, PEP targets the creation of 200 formal employment through 15 “Pemulung Empowerment Centers” spread out across 7 Indonesian Provinces. The objective is that 4500 waste pickers affiliated to those centers can get access to social services such as health insurance, children education, micro credit through plastic and carton recycling and transformation activities. This also may help sourcing high quality flakes for AQUA rPET suppliers.