Modi Wants to Take Away India’s Plastic Bags and Spoons

(Bloomberg) -- India has a mammoth plastic waste problem and no easy way to dispose of the 9.4 million tons it generates each year.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi wants to fix that. Fresh from his campaign to provide tens of millions of toilets for India’s citizens, he’s now aiming to limit the consumption of single-use plastic -- bags, cups, straws, disposable cutlery -- and eliminate its use by 2022. The initiative, to be launched Wednesday, marks the 150th birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi who wanted everyone to “be his own scavenger.”

Unlike scrap metal that’s recycled almost entirely, about 90% of the plastic the world has produced so far has been discarded as waste, resulting in global environmental and social damage of more than $2.2 trillion every year. More than 60 countries have so far introduced bans and levies to curb single-use plastic waste.

Africa stands out as the continent where the largest number of nations have instituted a total ban on the production and use of plastic bags, according to a 2018 United Nations report. In Asia, several nations have attempted to control the manufacture and use of plastic bags through levies, but the enforcement regulations have often been poor.

A crackdown on plastic in India risks job losses in an economy that’s seeing the slowest expansion in six years and unemployment at a 45-year high, and rising.

The government’s ban on plastic items will disrupt the supply chain, raise the cost of goods from milk to biscuit packets, and impact the food processing and consumer goods industries, said Ankur Bisen, senior vice president with consultancy firm Technopak Advisors Pvt. in Gurugram, near New Delhi.

“There should be alternatives to replace plastic products,” said Bisen, who has authored a book ‘Wasted’ on India’s sanitation challenges. “The right environment should be provided to invest in recycling.”

Inadequate Disposal

While India has a low per capita consumption of plastic of 11 kilograms a year, compared to 109 kilograms in the U.S, citizens have been reluctant to shun plastic as it is cheaper than other alternatives.

Plastic waste is a worldwide problem, but it is acutely felt in India where towns and villages do not have adequate waste disposal systems. While about 60% of total plastic waste is recycled, the rest ends up on roadsides, landfills, lakes and oceans, eventually making way into the food chain.

The federal government has already prohibited light-weight plastic carry bags, while more than of the country’s states have completely banned those. Still, the enforcement of those rules is lax.

Industry Resistance

Industry lobby groups argue the move will affect small retailers, leading to the closure of plastic industries and result in job losses, while some companies are seeking government exemptions and subsidies to help them shift to alternatives, said Sadhu Ram Gupta, president of the All India Federation of Plastic Industries in Delhi.

Yet global business have started seeing opportunities. Total Corbion PLA, a joint venture between French oil major Total S.A. and Dutch chemical maker Corbion NV, is holding talks with airports, consumer companies, hospitality and food delivery chains in India to offer biodegradable plastic products.

“If jobs shift from the plastic industry, alternatives are going to come up,” said Anoop Kumar Srivastava, director at Foundation for Campaign Against Plastic Pollution in Greater Noida. “Employment opportunities will increase in eco-friendly sectors.”

As Modi himself is spearheading the move, the campaign is expected to be popular, following on from his ‘Clean India’ movement under which about 95 million toilets have been built across the country in five years.

Globally, a small change in the supply of plastic carry-bags has successfully reduced their use, said Almitra Patel, who led the 1996 litigation in the Supreme Court against open dumping that led to the nation’s first Municipal Solid Waste Management Rules in 2000, urging India to adopt a similar policy,

“If you don’t offer an alternative, people will ignore the ban,” said Patel, adding the country should focus on improving the collection of plastic materials, strengthening segregation and recycling. “Banning plastic should not be our objective, banning plastic mess, its littering and careless disposal, is what we have to focus on.”

To contact the reporters on this story: Bibhudatta Pradhan in New Delhi at bpradhan@bloomberg.net;Vrishti Beniwal in New Delhi at vbeniwal1@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Ruth Pollard at rpollard2@bloomberg.net, ;Nasreen Seria at nseria@bloomberg.net, Karthikeyan Sundaram

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