Written by Dorcas Aba Annan – Communications & PR Consultant
ASASE Foundation is thrilled to announce that our very own Sandra Abeka Mensah, Plant Supervisor, has been named “Packaging Woman Personality of the Year” at the PrimeAwards 2025 held in Dubai on April 10, 2025.
The PrimeAwards celebrates excellence and innovation in the packaging industry, bringing together brand owners, converters, printers, design agencies, and packaging companies from across the Middle East and Africa. The event highlights outstanding contributions in Innovation, Sustainability, and Business Performance.
Sandra is a passionate and results-driven recycling professional, committed to transforming waste management in the packaging space. With over three years of hands-on experience in recycling operations, she continues to lead with purpose of advancing sustainable practices, increasing recycling rates, and engaging communities to build a greener future.
We are incredibly proud of Sandra’s achievement and grateful to see her hard work and dedication recognized on such a global platform.
Read more about her nomination profile below:
Sandra Abeka Mensah is a passionate and results-driven recycling professional dedicated to revolutionizing waste management in the packaging industry. With over three years of hands-on experience in recycling operations, she has demonstrated remarkable leadership in advancing sustainable practices, increasing recycling rates, and fostering community engagement.
Her journey in the recycling industry is one of resilience and determination. She entered the male-dominated field with little job experience and no leadership background, starting as a Plant Technician at Cash It Recycling Plant. Through hard work, continuous learning, and a deep commitment to sustainability, she quickly rose through the ranks becoming a Line Supervisor and later a Plant Supervisor. Despite the challenges of breaking barriers in a traditionally male-dominated industry, Sandra has proven to be an exceptional leader, earning the respect of her peers and driving significant impact in the recycling sector.
As the Plant Supervisor at Cash IT Recycling Plant, she plays a pivotal role in the daily operations of plastic waste recycling, ensuring that waste materials are efficiently sorted, processed, and repurposed into valuable products. Under her leadership, she spearheaded an initiative to divert plastic waste from landfills by collaborating with a company to convert recycled plastics into pavement blocks, significantly reducing environmental pollution. She believes that tackling plastic pollution starts with product design and steering plastic use to those packaging solutions where their functionality benefits outweigh negative environmental impacts.
Beyond operational efficiency, Sandra is a strong advocate for gender inclusion in the recycling and packaging industry. She has trained 30 women and mentored four women into leadership positions, empowering them to take on supervisory roles in a traditionally male-dominated field. Her commitment to fair labor practices and gender equality has helped reshape the workforce dynamics within the industry.
Sandra’s expertise extends to optimizing recycling processes and led to the improvement of the working conditions to reduce contamination in waste handling activities by enforcing right Safety protocols. Her strategic leadership has led to a production yield increase from 27% to 35% in 2024 and subsequently to 35% in 2025. She participated in community engagement programs to drive segregation at source within the community of operation. She led the production team to achieve a minimum of 90% uptime in production, significantly boosting revenue generation.
She has also coordinated efforts to recycle an average of 2,400 tons of test in 2024 Low-Density Polyethylene (LDPE) annually, producing 600 tons of pellets for reuse in manufacturing.
Her contributions to the packaging recycling industry exemplify innovation, sustainability, and social impact. Sandra is not just transforming waste; she is redefining the future of packaging sustainability through her unwavering commitment to environmental stewardship and community empowerment.
As someone who is passionate about sustainability and waste reduction, Sandra has dedicated her career to making a positive impact on the environment and supporting ASASE foundation to create community-based social enterprises that engage deep in the community to mobilize resources necessary to create awareness about the plastic litter problem and the opportunity to cash in the value of plastic waste, when collected and recycled in the community.