The Story of The Recycling Workers Association

Abstract Recycling Workers Association (RWA), founded in 1993, has been the oldest associations in Turkey advocating the rights of recycling workers and conducting studies to ensure the security of their business through organisation. There were more than 2,000 families in Ankara, who emigrated from Gaziantep and lived in the Çankaya district of Ankara. We, as RWA, gained legal status by integrating with Çankaya Municipality’s licenced waste collection company. In the same year, the company we worked with was successful and received an award. Our work in this business, as being the first one in Turkey, has become known throughout Turkey and some provinces (Antalya, Gaziantep, Konya and Adana) began to implement the project. Our project was heard in foreign countries such as Norway and Germany.