Our Story

We’re cleaning up 80 years of plastic waste.

IT HITS CLOSE TO HOME.

We started in the Philippines. But we represent all of the places hit hard by end-of-life plastic waste. We know first-hand its toll on nature, the climate, the economy, and our health. There’s no time to waste. It’s a global problem that needs a global solution.

WE’RE FUELED BY HOPE.

Drawing from the success of our Hope in a Bottle program, we launched PCX to take on the massive challenge of global plastic waste. Our vision was to adopt only the best practices of carbon credits and apply it to plastic, but with transparency and impact at the core. We became the first nonprofit to do so.

LET’S THINK CIRCULAR.

The plastic ecosystem touches everyone. That’s why it’s crucial PCX works with businesses, local communities and the government. On one side, we created a platform for businesses to purchase credits and offset the plastic they can’t yet eliminate. On the other, we’re empowering communities with a livelihood based on plastic elimination.

WE’RE MOBILIZING A PLANET.

We’re building an ever-expanding network of partners who recover, process and recycle plastic waste. As we grow, we continuously seek out the latest environmentally sound solutions to plastic waste reduction, and find new ways to strengthen the circular economy.

WHAT WE CARE MOST ABOUT.

Purchasing offsets is not a license to pollute or maintain the status quo. If we want to succeed, we need to work together to hit UN Sustainable Development Goals along the way.

1

Restoring a Healthy Ecosystem

2

Responsible Waste Management

3

Livelihood Development

4

Empowering Women

1

Restoring a Healthy Ecosystem

01: Restoring a Healthy Ecosystem

The oceans give us oxygen, regulate our climate, and provide food and income for billions. Yet human activity has left them in a perilous state. By preventing plastic waste from leaking into our ecosystems, we hope to restore our oceans and protect our planet.

2

Responsible Waste Management

02: Responsible Waste Management

We partner with companies committed to environmentally preferred waste management practices. By commissioning stringent audits on all of our partners’ operations, we do everything we can to promote the effective reduction and disposal of plastic waste.

3

Livelihood Development

03: Livelihood Development

For us, sustainability means economic sustainability too.  Our model provides opportunities in development and environmental protection, as we empower frontline workers in the circular economy.

4

Empowering Women

04: Empowering Women

Through our Aling Tindera waste-to-cash program, we provide women with impactful work. Not only does it help build their organizational leadership and business management skills, they become champions of sustainability within their communities.

Doing Better, Together.

We come from different backgrounds, including environmental research, management, and policy, united by a common vision of a plastic wastefree world.

Institutional Partners

Technology Partner

Audit Partner

Audit Partner

Legal Counsel

Development Partner

Advocacy Partner

Development Partner

Program Partner

Program Partner

Processing Partner

Development Partner

Processing Partner

Aggregating Partner

Aggregating Partner

Processing Partner

Design Partner

Board of Trustees

Nanette Medved-Po

Founder

Nanette Medved-Po

Founder

Nanette is the Founder and Chairperson of Plastic Credit Exchange, Inc. (PCX), the first global non-profit plastic offset program that has built a community committed to seeking out the most environmentally sound solutions for plastic waste. PCX takes plastic pledges from companies around the world and provides ways to offset those footprints through credible post-consumer plastic removal and processing systems. 

She is also the Founder and Chairperson of HOPE. An impact company that invests 100% of profits to improve public school education infrastructure, agriculture interventions for smallholder farmers, and environmental initiatives in both the plastic waste and carbon sequestration spaces. HOPE was awarded the grand prize at Developmental Social Enterprise Awards by PriceWaterhouseCoopers, and was recognized globally as the Best New Brand and Best CSR by the Global Bottled Water Awards in Lisbon, Portugal. HOPE became the first Certified B Corporation in the Philippines for meeting the highest standards of social and environmental transparency and accountability.

She serves on the Board of Trustees of the World Wildlife Fund Philippines and on the Board of Directors of Winrock International in Arlington, Virginia. She recently received the NGO Leadership Award and Social Innovation Leadership Award from the Philippines Leadership Awards and was honored as one of Forbes’ Heroes of Philanthropy. 

She graduated Summa Cum Laude with degrees in Finance and Entrepreneurship from Babson College in Massachusetts.

Ron Hose

Board Member

Ron Hose

Board Member

Ron Hose is an entrepreneur and early stage investor in technology companies. He currently  serves as Independent Director of UnionBank.  Prior to joining the board of UnionBank, Mr. Hose was the founder and CEO of Coins.ph (acquired by Gojek in 2019), one of the first blockchain based financial services platforms to reach significant mainstream consumer adoption.   Mr. Hose was also a founding partner at Silicon Valley based venture fund Innovation Endeavors, and a founder at TokBox Inc, a San Francisco based videoconferencing startup that was acquired by Telefonica. Mr. Hose has solid experience in information technology, FinTech, Blockchain, e-commerce and venture capital, and has likewise rendered his FinTech expertise during various speaking engagements. He is a graduate of Cornell University in 2005 with a Master’s of Engineering Degree in Computer Science.

Maya Chorengal

Board Member

Maya Chorengal

Board Member

Maya Chorengel is a Co-Managing Partner at The Rise Fund, the world’s largest, global impact platform committed to achieving measurable, positive social and environmental outcomes alongside competitive financial returns. Founded by TPG in partnership with Bono and Jeff Skoll, and with more than $5 billion in assets under management, Rise invests in growth-stage, high potential, mission-driven companies that have the power to change the world. A longtime impact, private equity and venture capital investor, Maya also leads financial services and fintech investing for Rise globally and is a key architect of the fund’s impact methodology and assessment process.

 

Prior to joining TPG, Maya was a co-founder of Elevar Equity, a leading impact venture capital firm and she was previously Managing Director of the Dignity Fund, a private investment fund focused on local currency debt financing for high-growth microfinance institutions globally. Before becoming one of the early starters in impact investing, Maya began her private equity investing career at Warburg Pincus in the firm’s New York, Hong Kong and Menlo Park offices.

 

Maya currently serves as a Director of Benevity, EverFi, Varo Bank, Nishio, SEO, and Kiva. She also serves on the Advisory Boards of the Harvard Business School Social Enterprise Initiative and CASE i3 at Duke University, and co-authored a Harvard Business Review article entitled “Calculating the Value of Impact Investing.” Maya earned an A.B. in Social Studies from Harvard College (magna cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa) and an M.B.A. from Harvard Business School.

Vincent Perez

Board Member

Vincent Perez

Board Member

Vince is CEO of Alternergy, a renewable power company in Asia. He is the Chairman of Merritt Partners, an energy advisory firm and was a Board Trustee of WWF International and Chairman of WWF-Philippines.

He founded Next Century Partners, a private equity firm based in Singapore, and the Asian Conservation Company in the Philippines. Vince served as Philippine Minister of Energy and later as Vice Chairman of the National Renewable Energy Board.

He has invested in various sustainable energy and eco-tourism ventures, and is a member of the advisory boards of BDO, Coca-Cola Philippines, Pictet Clean Energy Fund, Singapore Telemedia, and the Center for Business and the Environment at Yale University. Vince holds an MBA from the Wharton Business School and obtained a degree in Business Economics from the University of the Philippines.

Gideon Agar

Board Member

Gideon Agar

Board Member

Gideon is currently CEO of Tradelegs,  a Fintech company applying AI to optimize options investment strategies, and its wholely-owned subsidiary Optimize.Advisors, an SEC-registered investment advisor. He has worked in the tech industry since 1988. In addition to management positions at Oracle and Cisco, he has held President/CEO positions at four companies and served in an executive director capacity on the boards of seven others. From 2007-2010 Gideon was a managing director at Patriarch Partners, a multi-billion dollar private equityfund. Gideon’s business experience encompasses a broad range of markets, geographies and company size, and touches all phases of the technology company cycle: startup, recruit management teams, develop and implement new technologies and markets, raise funds, acquire/invest, day-to-day operations (including turnarounds), and exit. Gideon has bachelor degrees in both Computer Science and English Literature from Brown University and an MBA from Harvard Business School.

Cem Sinirlioglu

Board Member

Cem Sinirlioglu

Board Member

Cem is a Founding Partner of Idea Farm Ventures, a NY-based consumer venture group that backs and helps build mission-driven brands, where he co-leads investments and value creation initiatives for portfolio brands. Prior to IFV, he was an active angel investor, board member, and advisor to early stage companies in the consumer and retail space. Previously, he worked in the finance industry, primarily in the financial advisory team at Lazard, where he advised corporations, financial sponsors, and sovereign wealth funds on M&A and restructuring transactions. He started his career as a public markets investor with a focus on global consumer equities. Cem currently serves on the boards of several IFV portfolio companies. He holds an M.B.A. with Honors from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and a B.A. from Brandeis University.

Advisory Board

Jennifer Brandon

Advisory Board Member

Jennifer Brandon

Advisory Board Member

Jenni received her PhD in Biological Oceanography at Scripps Institution of Oceanography in December 2017, focusing on the nascent field of marine microplastics. She is an expert in quantifying and identifying marine microplastics, and has developed multiple novel methods to identify the spatial and temporal ranges of microplastics and determine the age of plastics exposed to varying weathering conditions in the environment. She was the first to find microplastics in our temporal sediment record, and the exponential increase of microplastics she recorded from 1945-2009 closely correlates with the exponential increase in worldwide plastics production over that same time period.

Geraldine Acuna

Advisory Board Member

Geraldine Acuna

Advisory Board Member

Geraldine is the president of the Sunshine Care Foundation for Neurological Care and Research (SCF), an international non-profit organization dedicated to finding innovative ways of delivering free clinical and neurological care to indigent patients in rural areas of Asia. For over a decade, Geraldine has also served as Senior Counsel in alternative investments for Bracebridge Capital, a fixed income hedge fund based in Boston with over $13 billion in assets under management. Geraldine graduated with honors from Harvard College, a Master in Public Policy from the Harvard Kennedy School, and a Juris Doctor from Columbia Law School (where she also served as a member of the board and graduated as a Harlan Fiske Stone Scholar).

Miguel Cuunjieng

Advisory Board Member

Miguel Cuunjieng

Advisory Board Member

Miguel CuUnjieng is currently an Associated Director for EOS at Federated Hermes, and manages engagements in the North American region. Prior to joining the EOS at Federated Hermes team, Miguel worked at Wells Fargo within the Environmental and Social Risk Management group, where he refined the tools, procedures, and methodologies to assess the bank’s lending activity for environmental and social risks. He previously worked at Ceres Inc., serving as a strategic ESG advisor and Manager of the Financial Sector program. His work included facilitating multi-stakeholder engagements, leading deep dive presentations on sustainability issues and processes, and developing targeted analyses among other consulting deliverables. Miguel has advised companies on topics including corporate sustainability strategy, shared value partnerships, ESG disclosure, sustainability materiality assessments, climate risk, and environmental and social risk management. Miguel also served as the first Sustainability Manager for SM Supermalls, helping to develop the company’s initial operational sustainability program and author the company’s first GRI report. 

His professional experience includes advancing sustainability issues from the non-profit, in-house, and external consultant perspectives, and he has worked in the Southeast Asian and North American regions. His experience includes work in the financial, oil and gas, utilities, consumer goods, agribusiness, and land development industries. Miguel earned his MBA and from the Georgetown McDonough School of Business, and degree in Philosophy and Environmental Studies from Santa Clara University.

David Chandra

Advisory Board Member

David Chandra

Advisory Board Member

David is responsible for the APAC Microsoft Technology Center (MTC).  As the Senior Director at the MTC, he along with his team, works closely with key enterprise customers to help them through their Digital Transformation journey by providing tailored engagements from strategy briefings and envisioning workshops through to rapid prototyping. David has extensive background in the Government Industry and has worked on various projects in financial services, telecommunication, and internet commerce. He was the Microsoft technology advisor for the Singapore IRAS next generation taxation platform. In his earlier professional career as a software development consultant, he was one of the key architects and software development lead for the Australian Tax Office – ABN (Australian Business Number) Registration portal for small businesses. He was also involved in architecting and leading the team for the business loan origination system for one of the major banks in Australia.

Michael Gilmore

Advisory Board Member

Michael Gilmore

Advisory Board Member

Michael became Research Director of Albizia Capital in 2014. He also leads the firm's approach to ESG, integral to investment strategy, including being a UN PRI signatory since 2017. Given the firm's investment focus on ASEAN consumer companies, plastic waste plays an important role in its ESG focus: Michael is a member of the UN PRI's International Working Group on Plastics. Michael's first role as a consumer analyst in Asia was in 1997, starting with DBS Securities in Indonesia before moving to UBS in 1999. He became UBS's Head of Asian Consumer Research in 2001 based in Singapore, before joining Nomura Securities in the same role in 2005, and HSBC in 2010. Before finance, Michael pursued post-graduate studies at SOAS, University of London, having graduated from there in 1991 with a BA in Economics and politics, specialising in ASEAN, as well as freelance writing and journalism. In recent years, Michael has combined writing and finance by advocating for greater financial literacy. He has written two books, including "Happy Ever After", published by Wiley, that he wrote for his two teenage daughters.

Cesar Purisima

Advisory Board Member

Cesar Purisima

Advisory Board Member

Cesar was the Secretary of Finance for the Philippines and Chairman of Economic Development during the term of President Benigno Aquino. He graduated in 1979 from De La Salle University with Bachelor’s degree in Commerce, major in Accounting and Management of Financial institutions and subsequently topped the licensure examinations for Certified Public Accountants that same year. He completed his MBA in International Economics, Finance, and Marketing at Northwestern University in 1983.

Department of Trade and Industry Philippines (DTI)

Advisory Board Member

Department of Trade and Industry Philippines (DTI)

Advisory Board Member

DTI is a prime mover of consumer welfare. It is committed to protecting the rights and interests of the consumers and is also committed to developing policies and programs aimed at sustaining the growth and development of the Philippine economy. Besides overseeing the effective implementation and enforcement of trade regulation and fair trade laws, the DTI provides protection to consumers through consumer education and information dissemination programs.

Antonio La Viña

Advisory Board Member

Antonio La Viña

Advisory Board Member

Tony is a teacher, thinker, and lawyer. His legal and governance expertise includes climate change, biodiversity, biosafety policy, mining, energy, forestry, indigenous peoples' rights, community-based natural resources management, consensus building and negotiations, social accountability, local government, legal philosophy, and public ethics. He is currently the Dean of the Ateneo School of Government. Previously, he was a Senior Fellow and researcher at the World Resources Institute (WRI). From 1996-1998, he was the Undersecretary for Environment and Natural Resources of the Philippines. Tony is also a lead negotiator for the Philippines in the climate change negotiations. Tony obtained his Masters and Doctorate in Law from Yale Law School, his law degree from the University of the Philippines, and his Philosophy degree from the Ateneo de Manila University.

Jose Angelito M. Palma

Advisory Board Member

Jose Angelito M. Palma

Advisory Board Member

Joel holds a BS in Fisheries (Major in Inland Fisheries) Degree from the University of the Philippines. He handled the turtle conservation initiatives of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources before joining the World Wide Fund For Nature (WWF)-Philippines as a Project Manager for the Turtle Islands in Tawi-Tawi. He was a Governance and Environmental Democracy Fellow at Wolverhampton University under the Chevening Scholarship program in 2007 before his appointment as Vice President for Conservation Programs. Joel provided organizational direction and strategic interventions for both national and regional programs, including the Coral Triangle Initiative and the engagement of corporate partners. He designed and implemented the integration and linkage of national and regional programs, as well as the organization’s contribution to the achievement of WWF Global Network’s meta-goals. He now serves as the President and CEO of WWF-Philippines.

Core Management Team

Patrick Baskin

Development

Margarita Parma

Chief of Staff

Ilusion Farias

Impact

Meg Anne Santos

Downstream

Richard De Guzman

Standards and Compliance

Sophie Kuhlman

Human Resources

Giorgino Naval

Logistics

Selena Ortiga

Strategic Communication

Kia Ferrer

Finance

JC Calma

Marketing

Learn more about how PCX works

Our Process