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Vidya Deshpande
The ubiquitous plastic bag, dished out by every street side vendor will no longer be available. The National Plastic Wastes Management Task Force, in a recent draft notification, has banned the use of recycled plastic bags for edible items. Convenience aside, these plastic bags have been deemed as one of the biggest polluters of the soil, being responsible for choking drains and sewers and non-bio degradeability.
Statistics show that while the consumption of plastic is 1,889 thousand tonnes, the amount of plastic that is recycled is 800 thousand tonnes. The remaining goes into municipal solid wastes. Also, 60 to 80 per cent of the plastic recycled is collected by kabadiwallahs, rag pickers and waste dealers.
The task force, set up by the Ministry of Environment and Forests, has formulated an action plan in consultation with the plastic industry which includes self-regulation by plastic manufacturers. The draft notification gives the standards for the minimum thickness for plastic bags manufactured fromvirgin plastic as well as recycled plastic. The task force held meetings in New Delhi, Mumbai, Calcutta and Bangalore with representatives of raw material manufacturers, processors and re-processors, end users and local authorities.
``It was concluded by the task force that for effective management of plastic wastes should entail three R's: reduction, reuse and recycling. The implementation of the strategy would require the active participation of all sections of the society, but the industry and civic authorities would be the key partners,'' says Environment and Forest Minister Suresh Prabhu.
For the government-industry interaction, the Environment Ministry has set up the Indian Centre for Plastics in the Environment (ICPE). This centre will have defined objectives, targets and inputs for the creation of infrastructure for plastic waste management in the country. ``Packing constitutes 52 per cent of the plastics consumption and the task force has set the guidelines for the plastic manufacturers,processors and packers,'' says Prabhu.
But the task force is not stopping with the ban on recycled plastic bags for food items. Minimising the use of plastic, segregation of wastes and fines for littering of plastic bags are also on the cards. Since post-consumer plastic waste is the primary source of littering, they should be contained by promoting the use of dust bins, the task force says. Anti-littering measures such as penalties should be imposed, it felt. The provisions contained in the Himachal Pradesh Non-bio degradeable Garbage (Control) Act, 1995, has been made as the reference point by the task force.
The Bureau for Indian Standards (BIS) has recently laid down the guidelines for recycling of plastics and the Indian standard for manufacturing of products from recycled plastic. The BIS guidelines specify that recycling of `type-II' plastics (post-consumer material of unknown origin having visible impurities) should be banned. Instead these plastics should be used for energy recovery, it hassuggested. BIS has also recommended that the use of recycled plastic waste for certain items like toys, water bottles, carry bags should be allowed to use recycled plastic waste beyond the upper grade.
``Instead a blend of virgin plastic (50:50 ratio) should be encouraged and efforts should be made to downgrade the quality and performance of the end products,'' the guidelines say.
``But for integrated plastic waste management the industry plays a very important role,'' says Prabhu. The industry has been asked to take the responsibility as producer of the product. ``The industry has agreed in principle to set up a pilot collection project for a year or two and later the respective corporations can take over the project,'' says Prabhu.
To ensure that the plastic waste is managed properly, the ministry has included representatives from the industry in the task force to follow up these recommendations. They included representatives from Federation of Indian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Confederation ofIndian Industry and the plastic manufacturers association other than Central Pollution Control Board and government members.
Copyright © 1999 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
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This story was printed from Net Express located at http://www.expressindia.com. Net Express provides a portal to India, with news from The Indian Express and The Financial Express along with sites on travel and tourism, the entertainment industry, the power sector, the environment and much more.
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