Olekh Zhokhov is a businessman who knows everything about garbage collection, recycling and recycling. He heads the MAG Group holding, successfully developing projects in Dubai and Europe. In the Nizhny Novgorod Region, it owns the MAG-1 municipal waste landfill built using the most advanced technologies. Having extensive experience and knowledge in the field of waste recycling, Zhokhov is not going to stop there. His life goal: "To be the best in your field!"
The early years and early careers
Zhokhov Oleg Viktorovich was born on March 25, 1967 in the city of Gorky (now Nizhny Novgorod) in an ordinary Soviet family with an average income. Father Viktor Mikhailovich worked as a driver, mother Nina Egorovna worked as a seller. Oleg graduated from high school in his hometown, then he served in the Soviet army (1985-1987).
Upon returning home, Zhokhov began his career as a radio mechanic in the Auto fleet of the regional Department of Internal Affairs. In parallel, I thought about the need for higher education. He received a diploma in radio engineering from the Leningrad Electrotechnical Institute of Communications in 1993.
His first place of work related to recycling was Blitz-B. Zhokhov headed it on July 1, 1993. The company was engaged in the processing of plastic waste, from which it produced popular household products:
- plastic pots;
- garden hoses;
- cutting boards;
- plastic buckets;
- clothes hangers;
- camping glasses;
- hooks.
At the end of 1996, as a result of the reorganization, Blitz-B turned into Gostkhimprom CJSC. Zhokhov remained at the helm of the company until 2001. Then he headed the non-profit organization City Entrepreneurship Support Fund.
Trash business
The businessman has long been interested in recycling, and in 2001 he took an educational course on this topic. Zhokhov is a certified specialist in the field of construction and operation of landfills for solid waste. The knowledge gained was useful to him in his new job: in December 2002 Oleg Viktorovich became director of the municipal enterprise “Household Waste Recycling”. Six months later, the state organization became a limited liability company and changed its name to "Recycling of household waste in Nizhny Novgorod." Zhokhov retained the post of CEO.
In 2007, together with business partner Vadim Agafonov, he created the Agjo company, which united many companies and developed three areas of activity:
- housing management;
- waste collection and disposal;
- landfill operation.
The company "Agjo" more than once fell into scandalous stories related to dishonest business. For example, the Borodino solid waste landfill was built in dangerously close to settlements, which posed a threat to human health and served as a reason for litigation. Another case concerned the dissatisfaction of the residents of the houses belonging to Agjo. They regularly paid for repairs and maintenance, but in the case of dilapidated houses they tried to transfer them back to the municipal offices, which meant only a deterioration in the quality of building maintenance.
Polygon "MAG-1"
The most important project implemented by Oleg Zhokhov is the modern MAG-1 household waste dump. In 2009, the businessman created the MAG-Group holding and began to implement an idea that had no analogues in Russia. In the Nizhny Novgorod region, he decided to create a high-tech complex that works in three directions:
- landfill for disposal and burial of waste, bulky and construction waste;
- waste sorting and processing plant;
- collection and use of landfill gas for electricity generation.
The landfill was opened in 2012. It implements modern European technologies that protect the water and soil from pollution by waste. Garbage trucks arriving at the landfill undergo mandatory weighing at the entrance and exit to control the amount of garbage delivered. Also, all garbage is checked for the presence of radioactive sources.
In 2014, Mag-Group began construction of a waste sorting complex, and on May 25, 2018, it officially began its work. Uninterrupted round-the-clock work should ensure the processing of about 470 tons per year. The technological process is equipped with conveyor belts, optical sensors and sorting magnets. For processing, cardboard, paper, film, bags, non-ferrous and ferrous metals, tetra-packaging, a mixture of plastics are isolated. Recycled materials are stored in a warehouse in the form of briquettes.
Moving from Russia
In 2012, investigative agencies became interested in the activities of the Agjo company. Fearing criminal proceedings, Zhokhov moved to the UAE, where he headed the MAG GROUP company. In Dubai, he implemented another waste management project designed for Arab customers. Given the specifics of the country, one of the customer's proposals was to cover the garbage containers with gold. Also interested in the business of Zhokhov in Italy, he was invited to a meeting by the mayor of Rome.
Despite the promise not to raise tariffs for garbage disposal, in 2016 a wave of discontent among residents of Nizhny Novgorod caused a sharp rise in the cost of a cubic meter of waste by 66%. Arkady Mamontov’s film “Poisonous Business” was released on this subject on the Russia 1 channel. A two-year-old video was shown in the film, in which Zhokhov with a baseball bat in his hands promises to "remove the gorlopans" from his business.
Now Oleg Viktorovich still lives in the UAE, occasionally visiting Russia on business. Although recently, according to him, more and more often he has been thinking about creating a new project in his homeland.
