The city is fighting a losing battle trying to stem the flow of plastic in all its avatars — bags, cutlery or bottles. But citizens groups and activists are determined not to give up.
In line with ‘Beat Plastic Pollution’ — the theme for this year’s World Environment Day observed on June 5 — several organisations, including the Solid Waste Management Round Table and Hasiru Dala in Bengaluru, are part of a pan-India waste and brand audit.
They are members of the Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives (GAIA), or Gaia, which describes itself as a worldwide alliance of more than 800 grassroots groups, non-government organisations and individuals in over 90 countries working towards a ‘toxic-free world’ without incineration.
In India, the audit is being taken up in Bengaluru, Delhi, Pune, Mumbai, Chennai, various cities in Goa and Kerala, and north India. The aim is to highlight the need for various FMCG companies to put in place systems to manage the waste generated by their products as part of Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR).
In Bengaluru, the audit began on Sunday in Lalbagh, BMTC bus stand in Majestic and Mantri Square, and five dry waste collection centres in H.S.R. Layout, Koramangala, Bellandur, Marappanapalya and Yelahanka. The audit will end on Tuesday, and the data will be compiled by June 4.
Pinky Chandran from the Solid Waste Management Round Table said that as per the Plastics Waste Management Rules 2016, FMCG companies and manufacturers are required to phase out non-recyclable, multi-layered plastics by March 2018. Though there is a plastic ban, these kinds of plastic still add to the municipal waste, some of which is sent to the DWCCs along with the dry waste.
“We believe that this exercise will reinforce the need to put in perspective the importance of using a life-cycle based approach to packaging, integrate informal waste workers in resource recovery, choose recycling over incineration, and emphasise the need for companies to take responsibility in ensuring end of life waste management of their products, thus closing the loop,” she said.
Shanthi, who spearheaded the audit in H.S.R. Layout, said that the idea was to look at branded litter and non-branded litter from three household categories (broom covers, gasket covers), food (chips, biscuit packets) and personal care (soaps). “We are sifting through the dry waste and categorising them further according to the companies manufacturing these products,” she said.
