The CPCB has approached the National Green Tribunal (NGT) to enforce the implementation of plastic waste management rules by non-compliant states.
Only
14 of India’s 35 regional pollution boards filed information on
plastic waste generation in 2017-18, according to the latest report
of the Central
Pollution Control Board (CPCB). Thus, the CPCB estimate of
plastic waste generated in India in 2017-18--660,787.85 tonnes,
enough to fill 66,079 trucks at 10 tonnes a truck--does not reflect
the situation in more than 60% of India’s states and union
territories.
In
2016-17 too, CPCB received these figures from only 25 regional
pollution boards. The total plastic waste generation figure for that
year was estimated at 1.6 million tonnes, or 160,000 truckfulls.
The
CPCB has approached the National Green Tribunal (NGT) to enforce the
implementation of plastic
waste management rules by non-compliant states. On March 12,
2019, the NGT ordered all of them to ensure that reports are
furnished to the CPCB by April 30, 2019. Failure is to be punished
with a penalty of Rs 1 crore per month, to be paid to the CPCB, the
NGT said.
India
consumes an estimated 16.5 million tonnes, about 1.6 million
truckfulls, of plastic annually, as per this June 2018 report in Down
to Earth that cites data provided by PlastIndia Foundation, a
conglomeration of associations and institutions that deal in plastic.
Of this, 43% is plastic manufactured for single-use packaging
material that will mostly find its way into garbage bins, the report
said. In all, 80% of total plastic produced in India is discarded.
It
mostly ends up choking landfills, drains and rivers and flows into
the sea where it is ingested by marine animals. It leaches into soil
and water, contaminating the natural environment with poisonous
dioxins.
At
least 40% of the plastic waste generated every day--25,940 tonnes or
about 2,594 truckloads, as per this 2015 CPCB study for the year
2011-12--goes uncollected. Thin plastic bags and films do not have
enough value in the recycling market--they fetch no more than Rs 4 a
kg--to be collected by ragpickers.
Accurate
data on plastic waste generation, collection and disposal are
integral to how a country formulates its policy on waste management.
India needs these figures even more since it has stated its resolve
to phase out single-use plastic at the 2019 United Nations
Environment Assembly (UNEA) and also banned the import of plastic
waste into the country.
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