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A town in Brazil is giving residents a delicious reason for recycling. For the past 10 years city officials have traded garden fresh vegetables for recycled trash. The initiative has been so popular, it's spread across the nation and to other countries like Mexico.
The program called Delicious Recycling was born out of necessity in the city of Jundiaí, which is located about 60 km from Sao Paolo. The idea was simple: city streets could be kept cleaner if residents recycled aluminum cans and plastic bottles. But how could they be motivated? Food was the answer.
City officials rewarded participating residents with vegetables grown in one of the city's public gardens. Now there are over 30,000 plants that feed food-loving residents. Mayor Miguel Haddad lauded the program in the local newspaper Jundiaí Online: ''What once cluttered and even choked the flow of water from storm drains is today used as currency for healthy food.''
