Access Holdings Plc has expanded opportunities for skills development and local entrepreneurship through its circular-economy initiative, A Sandal More, which transforms discarded tyres into school footwear for children in underserved communities.
The programme, implemented in partnership with FREEE Recycle, has trained 100 young people in shoemaking and entrepreneurship, while providing more than 10,450 children with durable sandals made from recycled materials.
Access Holdings said the initiative had also reached 50 schools and diverted approximately 8,000 waste tyres from unmanaged disposal, creating opportunities for young people and other participants in the recycling and footwear production value chain.
Head of Sustainability at Access Holdings Plc, Ayodeji Lawal, said the programme was designed to convert environmental challenges into economic opportunities while addressing practical barriers to education.
“This initiative is not simply about distributing sandals. It is about converting an environmental liability into an educational asset and an economic opportunity.
“That is the kind of shared value we seek to create through our social investments, bringing together environmental responsibility, social impact, and sustainable livelihoods,” Lawal said.
Each sandal produced under the initiative contains 85 per cent recycled material, linking community waste collection and recycling with local manufacturing and the distribution of footwear to schoolchildren.
The programme began with the distribution of 2,200 pairs of sandals to 10 public schools in the Apata and Dugbe areas of Ibadan before expanding to other communities across the metropolitan area.
Founder of FREEE Recycle, Ifedolapo Runsewe, said the partnership with Access Holdings, which began in 2024, had enabled the organisation to transform more than 8,000 tyres into sandals for children across several communities.
Apart from providing footwear, the initiative seeks to strengthen local livelihoods by equipping young people with practical skills that could support employment and entrepreneurship in the footwear and recycling sectors.
Access Holdings said it would continue to improve the measurement of the programme’s impact, including the number of children and schools reached, materials recovered, skills developed and longer-term educational and livelihood outcomes.
The initiative aligns with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals on quality education, decent work and economic growth, responsible consumption and production, and climate action.
