Drive to curb multi-layered plastic waste in the Nilgiris launched

The Nilgiris district administration is spearheading an initiative to convince the manufacturers of products with multi-layered plastic packaging to help in dealing with the waste generated after their products leave the stores.

Collector of the Nilgiris Lakshmi Bhavya Tanneeru says that aided by the ban on single-use plastics, the administration has restricted the use of polythene covers and juice and water bottles with a capacity of less than five litres. “We [The Nilgiris] are much better placed than many other districts and even States. That is because we are easily able to stop them at the checkpost.”

However, this success in dealing with polythene covers and plastic bottles has not extended to multi-layer plastics. According to the Collector, the Madras High Court has directed the district administration to contact companies that supply products to the Nilgiris so that they could come up with alternative solutions like eco-friendly packaging. “But the challenge is that these are huge multinational corporations and they will do packaging for the entire country and they won’t do anything separately for the Nilgiris,” she points out.

As the first step towards identifying the companies that have the biggest footprint in products sold and waste generated as a result, a brand and waste audit has been conducted in Coonoor. The exercise will be done in Udhagamandalam and Kotagiri, too.

“For this brand audit, we have teams to conduct surveys at each shop and collect product and packaging samples. We will take a sample size and then extrapolate it to the number of shops and establishments here,” the Collector says.

Once the audit is completed, the district administration hopes to get in touch with the brand with details of the impact of the products and their packaging on the district. “Our plan of action has two parts — one is to tell the corporations that they are contributing a specific amount of plastic waste and also get them to help in waste management through Extended Product Responsibility (EPR). They can also come up with better alternatives,” Ms. Tanneeru says. said.

When contacted, a spokesperson of Clean Coonoor, which undertook the audit in Coonoor, said the exercise covered around 12,000 households and 1,000 commercial establishments. It led to a few findings.

Primary generators

The key finding was that the primary generators of category-3 plastic waste (which is difficult to recycle) is produced by five corporations — Hindustan Unilever Ltd., Proctor and Gamble, ITC, Nestlé, and Mondelez.

These companies must share the handling and disposal cost for the entire quantity of plastic waste generated, which is around 150 kilograms in Coonoor. A total of 33,163 individual units of plastic packaging were found generating waste during the audit, with 15,461 of them being category-3 plastic waste.

Clean Coonoor also estimates that only 70% of the the waste generated in the town reaches recycling facilities and small packaging — such as toffee covers and sachets — becomes litter. The Collector says diapers are discarded by users, including tourists, and the administration is trying to ascertain the quantity of diapers sold so as to “put some kind of system in place”.