RAP Return All Plastic pack

This ‘RAP Return All Plastic’ pack is significant as an interesting example of an industry-led recycling campaign where ground-breaking local hip hop artists, primary school education and anxieties over increasing use of plastic overlap. The pack features the hip hop group Double J and Twice the T who brought New Zealand hip hop into the mainstream.

The RAP pack was a school resource produced by the New Zealand Milk Corporation in 1990 for a campaign called RAP: Recycle All Plastic. It comes with a tape cassette with two songs by hip hop artists Double J and Twice the T, a poster of the artists, lyrics to ‘Plastic Rap’ (which features on the cassette), a plastic ‘Rap Sack’ (to collect milk bottles), reward stickers, a board game, and a range of reference resources for primary teachers to use in getting their students on board with recycling plastic milk bottles. The campaign was run by the Corporation as an attempt to help ameliorate the increasing levels of plastic waste following the end of glass milk bottles in the late 1980s (glass bottles were initially replaced by cartons, and then by plastic bottles). To give a sense of scale, over 350,000 litres of milk were processed every day in 1989 by this one company (New Zealand Milk Corporation Ltd, 1989).

The New Zealand Milk Corporation set up the RAP scheme in upper North Island schools and intended to pay 30 cents a kilogram for plastic collected (Dominion, 19 June 1990, p. 14). ‘To get the message through to school-aged children, the corporation has called its scheme Return All Plastic (RAP) and launched it with a rap-music style song sheet and a glossy poster of New Zealand rap group Double J and Twice the T’ (Dominion, 19 June 1990, p. 14). The intention was to install collection bins at 600 schools from Warkworth to Taupo, with regular collections. The recycled plastic would be used for industrial products such as pipes, clothes pegs, buckets and potplant holders (Dominion 1990, 14). The corporation's chief executive noted: ‘The move to throwaway plastic bottles for milk has worried many environmentally conscious consumers, who believe reusable glass bottles are preferable. The corporation’s Takanini factory makes at least 115,000 two-litre plastic milk bottles a day. "With an output like that, we were naturally concerned at the contribution we were making to the environmental issues that face us all"’ (Dominion, 1990, 14). Such a campaign could be viewed as an example of corporate 'greenwashing', particularly in light of the devastating increase in the use of plastics in society as a whole since the 1990s.

Double J and Twice the T was a New Zealand hip hop group known for their 1989 hit ‘She’s a Mod (Mod Rap)’. The group’s members were Jeremy Toomata and Jerry Tala-Brown, and they helped open the way for future New Zealand hip hop artists to follow. Their involvement in the RAP campaign helps illustrate the wider story of how Pacific Island New Zealanders have had a major influence on the local music industry and popular culture, particularly through hip hop and rap music. It also helps document New Zealand's unique local response to overseas music and youth culture, in terms of music, imagery and fashion.

Toomata and Tala-Brown met at Ōtāhuhu college in the 1980s. Toomata was a beatboxer into hip hop, and Tala-Brown was a rapper. Tala-Brown discovered his passion for rap in the classroom. When tasked with delivering a talk on any subject, he rapped his entire presentation (about substance abuse) and was quickly recognised for his talent. He became the group's primary vocalist. Toomata, who was becoming known for his beatboxing talent, saw Tala-Brown perform, and they joined forces. They entered the school talent quest and won. Their music teachers encouraged them to enter the Battle of the Bands which they won as well, followed by winning several local rap contests and a Telethon competition in Manukau City. One of the judges was Ray Columbus, who supported the duo in remaking his 1964 pop song ‘She’s a Mod’ as a pop-rap song. In 1989, ‘She’s a Mod / Mod Rap’ peaked at number 2 on the New Zealand Top 40 chart. Their music was released by Definitive Records founded by former Split Enz members Mike Chunn and Tim Finn.

In 1990, Double J and Twice the T teamed up with Auckland Regional Council’s water conservation campaign for the pop single ‘Def to be green’. They toured the country performing at schools to disseminate the campaign. Likewise, they teamed up with the New Zealand Milk Corporation in 1990 on the RAP campaign.

Double J and Twice the T released three top-ten singles before breaking up in 1991. While some saw their music as light and commercial, they played a crucial role in bringing hip hop to a wider audience in Aotearoa. One of New Zealand’s most successful hip hop stars, Scribe, was inspired by them when they performed at his school in Christchurch.