Readcycling week is our campaign for people to organise book drives at their organisation or community.

A week for people to donate 1 book and 1 pound to fund its journey to Africa.

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How It Works

At Books2Africa, our ‘readcycling’ model is designed to extend the life of educational materials by preventing perfectly usable materials such as books and computers from going to recycling/landfill sites in the UK. According to the UK Government’s Waste Strategy, “we use too much and are too ready to throw things away, and this waste causes damage if it is not managed properly. We can no longer ignore this” (p 15). 

Although you can organise a book drive at any time, Readcycling Week is the perfect opportunity to get others involved in your workplace, school, college, university or community. 

Sign up to get started

Complete our sign up form to register for Readcycling Week. We'll send you a Welcome Pack including posters, flyers and information you need to start spreading the word for people to donate.

Collect books and raise funds

Have a designated drop-off point for people to drop-off their donated books and a fundraising bucket for cash donations. Use cardboard boxes to package all items collected ready for collection.

Ship items and track your impact

Contact us to arrange a collection and get a booking reference to write on your boxes. You'll get email notifications when your books are shipped and a picture of the recipient when delivered.

Types of Books We Accept

Please take some time to read what we accept before starting your #ReadcyclingWeek

  • New or Used books
  • Written in English, French or any African language
  • Nursery, Primary, Secondary and University textbooks
  • Dictionaries, Encyclopaedias and Reference books
  • Novels, Hobbies and Leisure books
  • Bibles, Hymnals and Religious books
  • Unused Notebooks, Exercise books and stationery
  • Ex library or charity shop books
  • Comics
  • No damaged or illegible books
  • No folders, ring-binders or photocopied materials
  • No brochures, pamphlets or lecture notes
  • No pornography

How we process donated books

Each of your donated books will be scanned and catalogued at our Processing Centre to create a record of all your donated books. A minimum of 80% of donated books are allocated to one of several subject categories and palletised together with similar books from other donors ready for shipping to projects in Africa. The remaining 20% consists of books that are sold via our Charity Shop to fund our overheads and about a small minority of damaged books which are recycled responsibly.

Tracking the journey of your books

You can follow the journey of your books using your booking reference via our Impact Portal and we’ll also send you email notifications at different stages of your book’s journey. Some of your books will be labelled with a yellow impact sticker which will allows us to send you back pictures of the beneficiary who received the book in Africa. 

Readcycling Week Checklist

Please take some time to read what we accept before starting your #ReadcyclingWeek

Sign Up to Get Started

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