Antoine de Saint-Exupéry once said, “The essential is invisible to the eye”, and he was right. The most important things in our lives are not what we can touch, but what we feel. However, this only applies to our inner world. The outer world is made up of essential but finite elements that CAN be seen, felt, and measured, and that one day will run out.
Oil is one of these elements and it is used to manufacture most of the plastic products we use in our daily lives. But it is a finite resource which is expensive to extract and process, and it has a terrible impact on the environment.
The SARETU initiative has been launched to help fulfil the urgent need to transition towards more sustainable alternatives. We need to make recycling a way of life and a global philosophy. But, above all, we must reinvent the way in which we reuse the waste generated by one of the oldest and finest trades in existence: fishing.
Nets are the main tool used for fishing, and so they are to SARETU. In our commitment to collect and manage fishing waste, we have also managed to give a second life to fishing gears that had reached their end of life. We are creating a whole new line of resources, materials and products that will help to clean up the oceans.
TRANSFORMING NETS.
HOW DO WE DO IT?
1. DETERMINE THE ORIGIN AND REMOVE
SARETU coordinates the collection and management of fishing gear that is discarded and stored in the home ports of the main oceans once its lifecycle is over.
2. CONDITIONING
SARETU coordinates the collection and management of the fishing gears that are discarded and stored in the home ports of the main oceans once their lifecycle is over.
3. RECYCLING
Once conditioned, the nets are recycled, giving them a second life.
4. PRODUCTION
The recycled material from the nets can be used for a wide variety of products and for applications that range from the textile sector to the automotive sector and beyond. It is a versatile material that gives a new lifecycle to nets and plastic waste, while cleaning up and ensuring respect for our seas and marine ecosystems.
What do we achieve?
1) Recycled material from nets.
2) Reduction of greenhouse gases.
3) Reduction of the use of non-renewable resources.
In Basque, the word “Sare” translates as “net”. SARETU RECYCLING is a newly launched company whose main objective is to recycle and give a new use to discarded fishing nets that have reached the end of their lifecycle.
Founded in 2022 by four well-positioned companies that are experts in the sector, we offer a solution to a current environmental problem: the accumulation of discarded nets. SARETU has the necessary know-how and has undertaken research projects which guarantee the feasibility and quality of each of the recycling processes.
SARETU’s mission is to make the maritime and fishing sector more environmentally friendly, a sector that works in harmony with the environment. Our activity is focused on cleaning and preventing discarded nets that have reached the end of their lifecycle from ending up on the seabed.
Our main philosophy is the circular economy and in line with this we give the waste a second life, transforming fishing nets into a variety of useful products. We firmly believe in what we do and in the importance of our work and commitment. We work every day so that SARETU not only contributes to society in an active way but also serves as an example to inspire other sustainable projects that are committed to the 5Rs of sustainability: reduce, recover, repair, reuse and recycle.
SARETU was born from a seafaring tradition and this background guides our identity and way of doing things. We have a deep knowledge of the sector and its requirements and are fully aware of the need to take responsibility for the waste generated by maritime industries.
We are fishermen and sailors. We were born from the sea and to the sea we will return. However, above all, we will make sure that future generations have the possibility of experiencing the sea as we have done. For this reason, SARETU’s challenge is to generate circular recycling systems to transform waste into valuable resources. These can then be used to manufacture high-quality materials that work in harmony with the environment. In short, our challenge is to make the fishing sector a global example for the circular economy and a sustainable future.
