The medals for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics will be forged from recycled metal from old mobile phones and appliances donated by the general public to give them a sense of direct involvement in the Games, organisers said.

The move is also part of an effort to promote sustainability and save costs after the budget for the event ballooned to more than 3 trillion yen ($26.5 billion) at one point, though organisers reduced that sum to $16.8 billion late last year.

The Tokyo 2020 organising committee hopes to gather as much as eight tonnes of metal – 40kg of gold, 2,920kg of silver and 2,994kg of bronze – from outdated mobile phones and small household appliances donated by people across Japan.

This effort, the first of its kind for the Olympics, will ultimately result in two tonnes of metal, enough to make all 5,000 Olympic and Paralympic medals.

“There’s quite a limit on the resources of our earth, and so recycling these things and giving them a new use will make us all think about the environment,” Tokyo 2020 Sports Director Koji Murofushi said.

From April, collection boxes will be installed in local offices and the stores of telecoms firm NTT DoCoMo Inc.