29/08/2019
NEW DELHI (Reuters) – India is set to impose a nationwide ban on plastic bags, cups and straws on Oct. 2, officials said, in its most sweeping measure yet to stamp out single-use plastics from cities and villages that rank among the world’s most polluted.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who is leading efforts to scrap such plastics by 2022, is set to launch the campaign with a ban on as many as six items on Oct. 2, the birth anniversary of independence leader Mahatma Gandhi, two officials said.
These include plastic bags, cups, plates, small bottles, straws and certain types of sachets, said the officials, who asked not to be identified, in line with government policy.
“The ban will be comprehensive and will cover manufacturing, usage and import of such items,” one official said.
India’s environment and housing ministries, the two main ministries leading the drive, did not respond to emails from Reuters to seek comment.
In an Independence Day speech on Aug. 15, Modi had urged people and government agencies to “take the first big step” on Oct. 2 towards freeing India of single-use plastic.
Concerns are growing worldwide about plastic pollution, with a particular focus on the oceans, where nearly 50% of single-use plastic products end up, killing marine life and entering the human food chain, studies show.
The European Union plans to ban single-use plastic items such as straws, forks, knives and cotton buds by 2021.
China’s commercial hub of Shanghai is gradually reining in use of single-use plastics in catering, and its island province of Hainan has already vowed to completely eliminate single-use plastic by 2025.
India lacks an organized system for management of plastic waste, leading to widespread littering across its towns and cities.
The ban on the first six items of single-use plastics will clip 5% to 10% from India’s annual consumption of about 14 million tonnes of plastic, the first official said.
Penalties for violations of the ban will probably take effect after an initial six-month period to allow people time to adopt alternatives, officials said.
Some Indian states have already outlawed polythene bags.
The federal government also plans tougher environmental standards for plastic products and will insist on the use of recyclable plastic only, the first source said.
It will also ask e-commerce companies to cut back on plastic packaging that makes up nearly 40% of India’s annual plastic consumption, officials say.
Cheap smartphones and a surge in the number of internet users have boosted orders for e-commerce companies, such as Amazon.com Inc (AMZN.O) and Walmart Inc’s (WMT.N) Flipkart, which wrap their wares – from books and medicines to cigarettes and cosmetics – in plastic, pushing up consumption.
Source: Reuters
Posted in Amazon.com, birth anniversary, books, catering, cigarettes, cities, commercial hub, consumption, cosmetics, cotton buds, e-commerce companies, environment and housing ministries, environmental standards, European Union, federal government, Flipkart, forks, Hainan, human food chain, Import, independence leader, India alert, Indian states, killing, knives, mahatma gandhi, Manufacturing, marine life, medicines, nationwide ban, New Delhi, oceans, outlaw, outlawed, plastic, plastic bags, plastic consumption, plastic cups, plastic packaging, plastic plates, plastic products, plastic straws, plastic waste, polluted, polythene bags, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, recyclable plastic, sachets, Shanghai, single-use, single-use plastics, small bottles, smartphones, towns, Uncategorized, usage, villages, Walmart Inc, wares, widespread littering, wrap |
Leave a Comment »
27/06/2019
- The planet is only just waking up to the problems that plastics cause, a reader writes – but what is to be done?
Collecting plastic material from dirty water in Dhaka, Bangladesh, in April. Photo: Reuters
Tired of being the world’s dumping ground for recycled waste materials from other countries, Asian nations are
with punitive environmental trade regulations that should leave the waste exporting nations in delirium. Last week, the Malaysian Environment Minister, Yeo Bee Yin,
that countries should manage their own waste, and that Malaysia will take care of its own.
Modern economic theory maintains that the trade of global “goods” and services should be optimised by countries embracing their competitive advantages – letting others excel where their own advantages exist.
What it did not account for is the trade in “bads” between nations, whereby a country’s externalities (in this case waste) are sent to another’s shores to take advantage of the other country’s “competitive advantages” – low labour costs and lax environmental enforcement.
As a result of the planet’s awakening to the vast challenges of what do to with plastic in its second life, we now have two large-scale trade wars to contend with. One is between the two largest economies, the
. The other is much broader in scope, undercutting the previously perceived values of globalisation, using environmental trade barriers as a proxy for national benefit.
This trend should be expected to continue, as
is not the only ill which countries share with one another, but it is one that has generated the most sharing of ideas and momentum across virtually every country on the planet.
To put the scale into context, one can conservatively estimate that at least 10 per cent of the plastic waste sent to Asia for recycling was of quality too poor to make value from.
If all of this “poor quality” material from the European Union alone was returned to its rightful exporting countries for the past 10 years of their exports, they would receive over 95,000 40-feet containers, each containing 35 metric tons of material. This would create a line of containers over 1,150km (715 miles) long.
A global reckoning on waste is under way, thanks to China
It may not be likely that all 95,000 containers will be returned to their ports of origin, but it is clear that the ability to keep moving this volume of material offshore will quickly evaporate, creating all types of disruptions and needing innovative interventions to solve the complex plastic waste challenge.
Join us, and industry leaders and influencers, at our action-based plastic circular economy forum –
– on June 20 for a big discussion on how some of the solutions needed to address these new plastic defences can be for everyone involved.
Source: SCMP
Posted in Asia, Bangladesh, brewing, China alert, Dhaka, fights back, Malaysia, Malaysian Environment Minister, plastic waste, Plasticity Amsterdam, trade war, Uncategorized, world’s |
Leave a Comment »
CHINDIA ALERT: You'll be living in their world, very soon 