“Small bread tag - big difference!” has been the motto of Louis Trichardt Primary School since they joined the Bread Tags for Wheelchairs project.

Last week their collection was enough to make a difference in someone’s life with a wheelchair.

Bread Tags for Wheelchairs is a highly successful project of the Polystyrene Packaging Council (PSPC) that is currently in its sixth year. The project encourages people all around the country to collect their bread tags which are then sold for recycling and the proceeds are used to purchase wheelchairs for people who are unable to afford them. Hundreds of lives have already been touched by the project.  

The moment has arrived that somebody in the local community’s life will also be touched. The school children have been collecting bread tags since 2011. “The aim of this project has been to hand over a wheelchair to someone within our own (community) who could not afford the R1 750 required to purchase a wheel chair. We found that 247.5 kilograms of bread tags were sufficient for one wheel chair. With the aid of a retired nursing sister, Chloe Eilertson, we were able to acquire a wheelchair,” says deputy principal Ms Irene Adendorff.

The wheelchair was officially handed over to one of the directors of the Makhado Care Group, Ms Jernay McLeod, on 4 March. “The Makhado Care Group is an organization which is doing sterling work in our community in assisting cancer patients,” said Adendorff. The Makhado Care Group will decide on the use of the wheel chair.

Bread tags are made from high-density polystyrene and industries pay for them in order to recycle them into coat hangers, outdoor furniture, skirtings, cornices and seedling trays.

“We are definitely continuing with the collection of bread tags and encourage children to bring them to Ms Sussa Ehlers’ class. The value that the school would like to instil in the children is to make a difference in someone else’s life,” said Adendorff.