In collaboration with Deloitte, wallapop, the leading platform in the buying and selling of second hand products which promotes a model of responsible and sustainable consumption, conducted a study on the environmental and economic impact generated by his community last year. According to research, made in occasion of the tenth anniversary of the Spanish company present in Italy since 2021, thanks to the sale of second-hand products on Wallapop in 2022, 510,535 tonnes of CO2 emissions have been avoidedthe equivalent of 8 round trips by car to the sun.
Wallapop, the second hand that promotes the diffusion of product reuse
In a globalized world where current consumption rates are not sustainable, the circular economy represents an ally to change the way we consume and provide a solution to the climate crisis, even though it represents only 7% of the global economy.
Never more than today for Wallapop it is essential to contribute to the diffusion of the reuse of products and to the promotion of more responsible consumption. For example, last May 15th it was achieved l’Overshoot Day in Italiai.e. the day of the year the country went on ecological debtconsuming all the natural resources available for the current year, in relation to the regenerative capacity of the territory.
For this reason, the platform wanted to better understand the role it plays, taking into account parameters such as the replacement rate, which reflects how many reused products actually replace the purchase of new items, or the impact of the use of some specific products pre-loved.
Wallapop, second hand: research in collaboration with Deloitte
According to the results, the reuse of products by people who bought through Wallapop in the last year led to savings of:
- Over 20 billion liters of water (20.032.328.000), about the same quantity consumed by the city of Verona in 1 year;
- 22,031 tons of plasticthe amount needed to make a row of inflatable flamingos from Paris to Barcelona;
- 82,700 tons of metals (16,178 tons of aluminum and 66,522 tons of steel), enough to build the Golden Gate Bridge;
- All of this represents a saving for the environment equivalent to 723 million euroa sum that would be sufficient to reforest the Stelvio National Park 2.5 times.
Environmental and economic savings
According to data analyzed by Wallapop, in 56% of cases, the products on the platform would not have continued to be used if they had not changed owners, or if the owners had thought of getting rid of them or simply keeping them at home. This means that, in the last year, thanks to sales on Wallapop, they have been spared 31 thousand tons of wasteequal to those generated by the city of L’Aquila in 1 year.
The Wallapop community also confirms that in 81% of cases the purchase on the platform replaced a new purchase. This generated a total savings of €2,376 million in 2022. In fact, Wallapop users report a average savings of 44% buying recycled items instead of new and, according to the study, an average Wallapop user would save around 378 euros a year.
For each item purchased or sold on Wallapop, an average of 32 kg of CO2 emissions are avoided, the equivalent of a car journey between Malaga and Granada, and 1,240 liters of water are saved, the equivalent of the water consumed by a adult in 2 years and 3 months.
However, not all categories have the same impact. For example, motor vehicles have the greatest impact on reducing emissions, even though they have potentially higher fuel consumption. 38% of the avoided impact comes from this category, followed by home and garden (22%) and computers and electronics (9%).
Even buying a second-hand smartphone, one of the most popular categories on Wallapop, can lead to great benefits for people and the environment, with a 43% saving on the original price of a new one and a quantity of emissions equivalent to that produced from a passenger flight between Rome and Florence (53.6 kg of CO2). At the top of the platform’s annual sales are Samsung Galaxy mobile phones.
The word a Pol Fàbrega, responsible for the sustainability of Wallapop
“Prioritizing different patterns of production and consumption is a key part of responding to the climate crisis and its consequences, and people who use Wallapop are at the forefront of this front. When buying or selling recycled products, they make the most of every item produced and reduce unnecessary waste. They know that it is about smart, sustainable, quality and convenient purchases,” he explains Pol Fàbrega, responsible for the sustainability of Wallapop. “It is a necessary transition that has already begun, and at Wallapop we want to accompany everyone in this change of mentality. Since its inception, the company has helped people give more than 640 million products a second life.”