The National Green Tribunal is doing some great work on environmental stewardship, but its latest observation supporting a blanket ban on multi-layered plastic packaging and PET bottles is like shutting Mumbai’s suburban railway system because of accidents. Such a ban can never be a silver bullet solution. To its credit, the tribunal hasn’t passed a final verdict and has called all stakeholders for hearings that will begin on April 8. There is also a related case pending in the Supreme Court.
There are several issues at stake here. One, packaging plays a vital role in keeping products fresh and safe. Packaged products, especially plastic pouches, provide access to good health, hygiene and nutrition benefits of daily-use products (such as soaps, shampoos, oils, milk, food products etc) to consumers, in particular, those belonging to low-income households. A ban can also jeopardise the employment opportunities of a large number of people who are dependent on the industry, which will face crippling costs. For example, bio-degradable packaging is prohibitively expensive and would more than double packaging costs, making low-unit product packs unviable.
Two, flexible packaging is at the forefront of important trends in product protection, package design, customer convenience, waste reduction, and resource conservation through technology and innovation. Plastics has also evolved as a functionally convenient form of packaging both in developing and developed countries.
Three, currently available alternatives to plastics are cost prohibitive and on a life cycle basis, will do no good to environment.
Four, very few countries in the world have banned plastic packaging and most have gone in for extensive recycling to reduce the impact of littered or landfill waste which create environment hazards. So what is required is proper recycling/recovery process. Many consumer goods companies have reduced the weight of packaging, making it more recyclable.
In 2011, the environment ministry had issued rules to improve plastic recycling and had placed the onus of enforcement to state-level environmental departments and municipal governments. Local bodies are also supposed to ensure safe waste handling and set up direct plastic manufactures to set up such centres in line with the principle of extended producers’ responsibility. The move remained on paper.
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And five, the main problem with plastic bags is waste. Most bags end up in landfills. And because some people carelessly drop them all over the place, they are a major source of litter. Here, companies can take responsibility along with consumers, and with other players in the supply chain, to minimise as far as possible packaging waste going to landfill. It must be understood that dealing with ‘post-consumer’ waste, that is, the packaging and product leftovers thrown away after use, cannot be done by the companies alone. Meeting these targets will depend to a large extent on the existence of sound infrastructure in the country and level of consumer awareness, driven by enabling policies, partnerships and initiatives.
The infrastructure for dealing with waste is not yet fully developed even in big metros like Mumbai and Delhi. There is thus a need for creating a holistic, calibrated and sustainable waste management solutions until the country has fully developed viable alternatives to multi-layer plastic packaging. The industry can help overcome the challenges only by collaborating with multiple stakeholders such as governments, non-government organisations, retailers and other brands. It is no rocket science that such initiatives must consider each stage of the package life-cycle from the sourcing of raw materials for the package to disposal.
Politicians are known to always go for the low hanging fruit instead of thinking through a problem and finding a viable solution. The green tribunal can surely do better than that.