Sustainable future

To ensure plastic waste management is a success in India, infrastructure related to collection, sorting, recycling and disposal needs to be overhauled. More focus should be laid on the life cycle approach to reduce the environmental impact of the packaging product. There should be more investment in efficient waste management systems. There seems no role of consumers in this plastic waste management programme in India which makes its management less effective

- VANDANA MAURYA BIKASH KUMAR MALLICK

Global plastic production and consumption have experienced exponential growth over the past 70 years, reaching 430 million metric tons annually, with a majority ending up in landfills and causing pollution, including greenhouse gas emissions. This rapid expansion has turned plastic into a lucrative industry valued at $522.6 billion, projected to double by 2040. However, the environmental and health impacts of plastic production and pollution are significant, contributing to the triple planetary crisis of climate change, biodiversity loss, and pollution.

To address this crisis, the Global Plastics Outlook Report highlights the importance of recycled plastics markets, technological innovation, domestic policies, and international cooperation, including financing. Recognizing the urgency, this year's World Environment Day theme aims to curb plastic production, and the United Nations is working towards a binding agreement to end plastic production by 2024.

Plastics contribute to climate change. Yes they do, and it is evident. As plastics are manufactured using petrochemicals, their extraction, transportation, refining and manufacturing and post-consumer management emits GHGs. Across its lifecycle, plastic is responsible for generating 1.8 billion tonnes of GHGs a year. By 2050, GHGs emission from plastics is projected to reach 6.5 gigatonnes accounting for 15 per cent of the total carbon emitted (WWF Report).