Lahore (PR) Dasani, the bottled water brand of The Coca-Cola Company announced the winners of the Dasani Discovery Challenge competition, which had sought solutions for plastic waste management, a growing societal concern.

The competition was launched in November last year at the 021DISRUPT event of the incubator organization, The Nest I/O. Overall 73 entries were received, which were evaluated by a panel of 3 eminent judges, following which a shortlist of 12 entries was made. These shortlisted participants were then invited to make detailed presentations to the judges, based on which the final 3 winners were selected, all of whom happened to be from Karachi.

The first prize of half a million rupees was won by Umer Abid and team, who proposed using plastic waste as a road-building material, as is being done in several countries including Scotland, Dubai, India and Australia. The second prize of Rs. 300,000 went to Umer Farooq and team, who proposed manufacturing of building blocks, paver blocks, roof tiles, park benches, and other items using plastic waste. The winner of the third prize of Rs. 200,000 was Najmul Hassan whose idea was to create an architectural solution by using PET bottles as building blocks. The closing ceremony of Dasani Discovery Challenge took place on the Lahore edition of Cokefest, where more than 40,000 people were present.