With more summer holidays on the horizon for many of us, I thought I’d share a sighting from my trip to Malta last month.

Not long after stepping off the ferry service from Valletta at the Three Cities, we came across a public deposit machine (pictured above). The DRS is managed by scheme operator, BCRS Malta, which has been the first to deploy the Central Voucher Redemption Server by Sensoneo. The company describes it as “a digital infrastructure solution enabling real-time voucher validation, fraud prevention, and centralised financial control across reverse vending machine (RVM) networks and retail POS systems.”

The country’s DRS was launched in June 2022, with a 10-cent deposit, and saw an impressive 80 per cent collection rate in its first year. The DRS success is driven by “runners” who service the 350 machines on the island up to ten times a day, and a singular processing facility that manages nearly one million containers daily during peak summer seasons.

The public machines, such as the one I saw, are placed in strategic locations in the villages and cities around the island, but businesses operating in the HoReCa sector (hotels, restaurants and cafes/catering) are also able to participate in the scheme through their chosen method. BCRS Malta’s head of DRS and business systems, Rachel Micaleff, explains that they can either use a B2B card at one of their local RVMs, or BCRS provides its own manual collection system which is booked in advance and allows the businesses 25 free bags of containers per month. She also explained that larger businesses like hotels may also have their own RVM machines. 

A 90 per cent collection rate is now the new target for Malta this year, which seems incredibly achievable given collection rates in some areas have already reached as high as 87 per cent, BCRS Malta’s CEO, Alexander Galea, shared.

He said that to strengthen this rate in certain areas, BCRS will be looking at ways in which to improve collection for those in society who currently find it difficult to return in-person.

Despite this, manual collection – while in other countries makes up only around five per cent of the collection rate – stands at 15 per cent in Malta, so does go to show that the people who can will travel ‘out of their way’ to ensure their deposit is returned. In fact, someone did use the machine after I’d taken a photo of it, and even though I was disappointed not to see cans being returned but plastic bottles, I could still continue on my merry way knowing that the locals were playing their part in this important scheme.

Got a DRS success story to share with us? Get in touch.

Alex Rivers (she/her), CanTech International editor
Keep in touch via email: [email protected], LinkedIn: CanTech International magazine or X: @CanTechIntl