KarunaNews Story

Tomás Machuca, 24, is the founder and CEO of Fenikks, an Argentinian organization that transforms plastic waste into shin guards and distributes them to 56 under-resourced communities. “In Argentina, 57% of children and adolescents live below the poverty line,” said Machuca after he was honored by the International Olympic Committee for his work in. It started when his shin guards broke during a training session when he was 16 and there was no money left at home to buy new ones. “I took a bucket that I had lying around in the backyard, cut it with a saw, molded it with my grandmother’s hair dryer — which burned — and added a design with images of my family that I made in paint.” In the past five years alone, Fenikks has recycled more than 2,000 kilograms of plastic waste and delivered more than 5,000 pairs of shin guards to young athletes throughout Argentina. “We work so that in every neighborhood where a child plays barefoot, we can share the importance of caring for and maintaining the cleanliness of living spaces and provide sports equipment of all kinds,” Machuca said