A collection of used plastic bottles waiting to be recycled. Photo: Nareeta Martin/Unsplash
New Delhi: The government had banned the import of plastic waste in 2019 to promote the management of locally generated plastic waste to reduce packaging pollution in line with ‘Swachh India’ and ‘Swasth India’ campaigns.
In 2021, seven Indian companies sought the government’s permission to import 93,000 tonnes of plastic bottles waste from countries such as the US, Canada and Germany, citing their shortage in India.
Subsequently, an NGO on Wednesday urged the government not to resume import of plastic waste into India and said it should instead focus on recycling the local waste.
The Directorate General of Foreign Trade (DGFT) on Wednesday organised a consultation meeting to discuss an amendment to replace the term “prohibited” with ‘restricted’ in the import policy of polyethylene terephthalate – a.k.a. PET, a single-use plastic.
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The DGFT had invited representatives of Ministry of Environment, plastic waste importer applicants, Plastic Export Promotional Council and the NGO, Pandit Deendayal Upadhyay Smriti Manch (PDUSM), for the meeting.
Soon after the meeting, the PDUSM issued a statement urging the government not to resume import of plastic waste into India.
Vinod Shukla, PDUSM president and nephew of Jana Sangh leader Deendayal Upadhyay, said that during the meeting, he emphasised that there is no shortage of PET waste in India. According to industry data, more than 14 lakh tonnes of PET plastics are consumed annually in India, even with the world’s highest recycling rate of 80 per cent.
“About 2.8 lakh tonnes of plastic bottles waste never gets collected. While the whole world is banning such imports to strengthen local plastic waste management, India would be the first country to re-allow the import of plastic waste,” Shukla said.
“Our main aim is to increase the collection of local waste. Our country’s waste must be recycled first, before importing waste from other countries to make textiles/recycled products,” he said.