A Business Case for Plastic Waste Management

While big businesses are integrating circularity in operations, plastic waste management start-ups are experimenting with plastic credits and blockchains to address the issue

- Naina Gautam

Businesses have been battling with the plastic pollution issue for long. This was even before the United Nations declared it the theme of World Environment Day under the #Beat Plastic Pollution campaign this year.

A report titled Strategies for Sustainable Plastic Packaging in India: A USD 100 billion Opportunity till 2030 by the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry and Accenture (2020) focuses on two types of solutions in the packaging sector: reuse by return or reuse without return. The report highlights that reuse by return can reduce material value loss by $9 billion or 7 per cent.

According to NITI Aayog's Report on Alternative Products and Technologies to Plastics and their Applications, recycling is not the only solution to plastic pollution, but it also opens a window of opportunity for material innovation.

A positive turn of events is that many major companies have already taken steps to address the plastic issue. Over 500 signatories, including CocaCola, L'Oréal, Mars and Nestlé, have signed the Global Commitment. This joint initiative of the Ellen MacArthur Foundation and the UN Environment Programme aims to bring about changes in plastic production, usage, and recycling.

Rajesh Ayapilla, Coca-Cola India's Director (CSR and Sustainability for India and Southwest Asia), highlights the organisation's efforts to positively impact people's lives, communities, and the planet by doing business the right way. The company's Coca-Cola's World Without Waste Initiative focuses on creating a circular economy for plastics, covering the entire lifecycle of packaging from how packaging is designed and produced to how it is recycled and repurposed.