It is impossible to imagine a life without plastic. There is plastic everywhere, in our bags, in homes, at the workplace…
“It is important to manage this plastic waste in our lives and encourage usage of only such products of polythene that can be recycled,” said Abhinav Singh, Chief Executive Officer, Dehradun Cantonment Board.
The 37-year-old has started a Polythene Kachra Bank in the city to tackle plastic waste. The bank was started in September this year to eradicate waste from Dehradun and recycle the waste into useful products such as benches, tree guards, ply board and dustbins.
This Polythene Kachra bank and a waste management company have come together to ensure that every piece of plastic is recycled.
According to reports, India generates 3.4 million plastic tonnes of plastic waste and only 30 per cent of it is recycled. The plastic consumption in the country has risen at an annual growth rate of 9.7 per cent to 14.7 million tonnes in the financial year 2016-17 to 20 million tonnes in 2019-20.
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According to the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB), Dehradun city generates 131 tonnes of waste per day. Out of which 51.4 per cent waste is compostable, 19.6 per cent is recyclable in nature and rest are inert materials.
This Polythene Kachra bank and a waste management company called Shayna Eco Unified from NOIDA have come together to ensure that every piece of plastic is recycled.
Shayna Eco Unified is a company started in 2015 to reduce the dumping of plastics in the environment. It works with communities to recycle the plastic waste and create affordable materials and structural products.
“Dehradun being a tourist city now sees loads of waste being dumped here. So we thought of collaborating with Shayna Eco Unified to create a cleaner tomorrow for the generations to come,” said Singh
There are several rag pickers, slum dwellers and locals who come to deposit the garbage in the kachra bank and they are offered Rs 3 for every kilogram of waste. There are three stations in the city where people can deposit the garbage between 10 am and 5 pm. The bank wants to ensure that the garbage is not dumped into the ditches. There have been awareness drives for this project undertaken through pamphlets and loudspeaker announcements.
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Anoop Nautiyal, Community leader and special communicator in Uttarakhand said, “This initiative of establishing three Polythene Kachra Banks in Dehradun is laudable. Since the Dehradun Municipal Corporation has struggled to implement city wide segregation, the collection and recycling of plastic waste has been a continuous and vexing environmental challenge. The Polythene Banks thus provide a viable and functional platform to the citizens of Dehradun to collect their plastic waste and hand it over to a proper outlet”.
“I am glad that the city finally has a circular solution for its plastic waste. The Cantt Board has at least made a start in the right direction. I can only hope that this initiative spreads its outreach thereby facilitating the channelisation of larger quantities of plastic waste for resource recovery, recycling and regeneration of newer, circular products like tiles, benches, etc,” Nautiyal said.
