Paul Brislen: TCF Chief Executive discusses 71,000 phones diverted from landfill this year

71,627, that's how many mobile phones have been diverted from landfill this year.

The Telecommunications Forum has been running their re-mobile scheme since 2014, diverted almost a million phones since then.

The nationwide shutdown of 3G is leaving a large number of mobile phones obsolete, so many people are looking to get rid of their phones.

TCF Chief Executive Paul Brislen told Andrew Dickens that, 'if they can be reused, we get them recycled.'

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:09):
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Speaker 2 (00:16):
Seventy one, six hundred and twenty seven. That's how many
mobile phones have been diverted from landfill this year. The
Telecommunications Forum has been running their remobile scheme since twenty fourteen,
diverted almost a million phones since then. The nationwide shut
down A three G is leading a large number of
mobile phones obsolete. So many people are looking to get
rid of their phones in the coming weeks. It would

(00:37):
be nice if it doesn't now in the landfill. So
joining us right now is the TCF Chief executive Paul Brison. Hello, Paul,
Pure Andrew, how you doing good? So what are we
doing with these phones? And what should we do with
the phones we no longer like?

Speaker 3 (00:51):
Yeah, well, well you take the phone's end. Phones doesn't
matter what state they're in. If they can be reused,
we get them recycled so they get a new lease
on life. We've got an international partner Swapkit who takes
them and cleans them up and gives them a new
shell perhaps and sorts out the charging, all the rest
of it, and they sell those overseas in other markets,

(01:12):
but for the most part, most of our phones, if
they have reached the end of their life, we make
sure they're recycled properly and you don't end up with
toxic chemicals and lithium batteries and things like that in
the rubbish pump.

Speaker 2 (01:24):
Do you suck the rare earths out of them?

Speaker 4 (01:27):
I believe they do, yes, the rare earth minerals, which
they're not very There isn't very much of that in
the phones, but there's quite hard to extract, so stop
Kin are very good at that. They take out the
gold and all the other little bits and pieces of
cold san I think is one of them, and they
make sure they're dealt with because they can be reused.

(01:47):
Of course, they make sure they're doing.

Speaker 2 (01:48):
And finally, if you're throwing away your phone this summer,
should you be worried about your data being handed on
to strangers that's on the phone.

Speaker 4 (01:56):
Always make sure you wipe your phones first to a
factory reset. There'll be instruction somewhere in your phone about
how to do that, but we do do a double check.
We make sure we wipe all the phones before they're
passed on, so there's no risk of the ending un
toward happening with your data data.

Speaker 2 (02:11):
You're doing good work, Paul Brisine. I thank you so
very much from the New Zealand Tellercommunications Forum. Here is
the chief executive.

Speaker 1 (02:16):
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