Hand over your plastic toothbrush and get an eco-friendly one at a subsidised price. At a time when there is increasing emphasis on replacing plastic toothbrushes, which are usually disposed of at least twice a year, with eco-friendly options such as bamboo toothbrushes, a drive has been started to collect plastic brushes to recycle them and produce poly fuel out of it.
Though the drive was to end on June 5 to coincide with World Environment Day, the organisers have decided to extend it to the whole month as it was a weekday and they got a lot of calls from interested people.
Raghuveer Panaghanti, the event manager, said since they started on June 1, they have sold 600 bamboo toothbrushes, but collected only around 80 plastic ones. “The recycling drive is to encourage and educate people about alternatives to plastic toothbrushes, one of the major polluters around the world. Toothbrushes are made of hard plastic and recycling is also hard because it has has rubber for grip. So a lot of it ends up in landfills and oceans,” he said, adding that they were giving away bamboo toothbrushes at subsidised prices even without plastic toothbrushes being deposited.
The brushes are being sold in two ranges: ₹100 for Indian made ones, and ₹200 for brand ones made in the U.S. They cost ₹150 and ₹300 otherwise.
The drive is on at 14 locations as collection centres and 40 retailers selling the bamboo toothbrushes. More details are available on the Facebook page: Plastic Toothbrushes Recycling Drive.
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