Unused mobile phones and personal computers, CDs, remote controls — an average household today has these stacked away in some corner of the house. Households contribute about 15 per cent of the nearly 86,000 tonnes of e-waste generated in the country’s tech capital, but disposal continues to be unorganised. Hazardous e-waste is usually handed over to local scrap dealers, leaving the city’s 34 authorised e-waste recyclers functioning at 10 per cent of their capacity.
It is this problem that prompted 35-year-old Achitra Borgohain to come up with “a fun and socially responsible way” of waste disposal. His start-up, BinBag, is currently being incubated at the Indian Institute of Management Bangalore’s N.S. Raghavan Centre for Entrepreneurial Learning (NSRCEL). The two-month-old concept aims at rewarding people in exchange for e-waste.
“People tend to hoard electronic items, such as old wires, cables and mobile phones, at home. Other dry and wet waste is disposed off regularly. E-waste is even more hazardous when it reaches the landfill and is burnt. Our purpose is to channelize e-waste to authorised recyclers and provide that last-mile connectivity,” Mr. Borgohain said.
An alumnus of Sainik School in Assam, Mr. Borgohain did his engineering and MBA in Gujarat. He has been in Bangalore since 2006. So far, BinBag (www.getbinbag.com) has organised three events where thrash was exchanged for rewards, Mr. Borgohain said, and added that a coupon-based approach was the next step.
“As of now, local scrap dealers pay consumers a higher rate for e-waste compared to authorised recyclers. We are in talks with some e-commerce companies to set up a coupon model after which we can catch up with the rates offered by scrap dealers,” he said.
