Page 42 - Plastics News October 2018

FEAturES

products, promoting public procurement and enhancing creation at community level as well as centralized level
overall consumer awareness, and harmonising standards in ULBs. Demand for semi-automatic or fully automatic
and certification. composting machine is likely to increase in the residential
Waste Management societies and demand for WTE, Biomethanization, RDF
There is much value in waste. The environmental setups are slated to increase across ULBs. Private sector,
and social gains, are truly remarkable.Bigger benefits whether directly or indirectly will play a very important
arise as recycling value chain is typically more labour role in partnering with ULBs, Municipalities to shoulder
intensive it can potentially generate 6-8 times more jobs the burden of waste management through technology.
than by land-filling or incineration activities of wastes. Technology providers will see demand from ULBs and
While source segregation has to be actively promoted Residential societies alike.
through behavioural shifts, the four million rag-pickers Sanitary landfills is no more a viable option for mega cities
and kabadiwalas should be substantially incentivised like Mumbai, Bengaluru, Chennai & others, and hence
and trained to efficiently transfer technology will have to leveraged
sorted waste to the recyclers. Why India should promote to effectively and efficiently,

A key policy thrust should be to Recycling reduce, recycle, re-use waste.
achieve a systematic formalisation There has been technological
of this sector — the rag-pickers • More than 70% of collected urban waste advancement for processing,
should be given an official identity, is dumped at landfills. treatment and disposal of solid
trained on environmentally safe • India’s annual waste generation likely waste. Energy-from-waste is a
scrap-handling practices and to be 165 million tonnes by 2030 and crucial element of SWM because it
supported with a minimum wage. 450 mt by 2045. reduces the volume of waste from
However, the key aspirational disposal also helps in converting
social transformation should be • India provides a tremendous potential the waste into renewable energy
to enable rag-pickers, with some for reuse and recycling of products and organic manure. Ideally,
assistance from the government, • There is much value in waste it falls in the flow chart after
to eventually move up the value • Offers a multi-billion dollar opportunity segregation, collection, recycling
ladder and themselves become and before getting to the land
recyclers, thereby, exemplifying the • Recycling would create local jobs. fill. But many waste to energy
true rags to riches entrepreneurial • Recycling saves Foreign exchange plants in India are not operating
journey in this so-called uneconomic to their full potential.Installation
sector. At an institutional level, the • Protects environment of waste-to-compost and bio-
government may consider setting up methanation plants would reduce
of a national authority on material recycling, primarily the load of landfill sites. The biodegradable component of
as a body to promote recycling among public and private India’s solid waste is currently estimated at a little over
players, help recyclers adopt international best-practices 50 per cent. Bio-methanation is a solution for processing
and enable coordination, and harmonisation among biodegradable waste which is also remains underexploited.
existing policies and rules to achieve a high-performance It is believed that if we segregate biodegradable waste
recycling economy sooner than later. from the rest, it could reduce the challenges by half.
Multi-billion dollar opportunity Following successful examples in China, the government
The researchers see waste management as a multi-billion can also set up dedicated material recycling zones
dollar opportunity for the private sector as the public (MRZs) to help the recycling industries operate in a
sector finds itself in spot when it comes to effective globally competitive fashion. However, ultimately
waste management. ULBs will seek the participation consumer behaviour and business practices are the key
of private sector and its citizens to help deal with the in transitioning to a circular economy. Government and
challenge of burgeoning solid waste in almost all cities businesses should work together to create a system of
across the country. It’s inevitable that decentralized incentives and disincentives to nudge citizens favourably
approach to waste management will lead to capacity to consume reused and recycled products.

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