Minister of Environment, Mining and Spatial Planning Oliver Dulic today marked the beginning of a project to collect used batteries in retail stores, symbolically placing a container for batteries in front of a Maxi store at Cvetni Trg.

Dulic said that the project was devised in cooperation with the Delta Maxi retail chain and battery distributor Axxon Trading.

The Minister observed that 7.8 million kilos of batteries are imported in Serbia every year and an average household has at least 20 batteries.

Used batteries usually end up in garbage, and poisonous matters and heavy metals from batteries eventually reach soil, underground water and human organism.

This is why it is necessary to introduce a broad system to manage this type of waste, recalling that boxes for used batteries will be placed in all Delta Maxi stores, the Minister said.

Dulic called upon other retailers to join the project in order to collect and recycle as many batteries as possible.

The project to collect used batteries is part of the Let’s Clean Serbia campaign. In the first stage, boxes for collecting used batteries will be placed in 65 Maxi stores throughout Serbia.