When Mandlenkosi Nkosi lost his job and began pushing a trolley around the East Rand looking for recyclables, he never dreamed he would one day own a booming waste recovery business employing 100 people across two provinces.

Having established himself in Gauteng, Nkosi, 53, has returned to his birthplace, Idutywa, to start a recycling network linking villages and coastal hotels with the aim of solving Mbhashe Municipality’s illegal dumping problem...