Gobar Times (Down To Earth's Supplement) -- Centre for Science and Environment (CSE)

PLASTICS

THE END OF THE CYCLE

Ever wondered what happens to your water bottle after it is thrown away? Or the plastic wrapping that goes around different food items? Or even the wrapper of your favourite cany bar? here in Delhi, much of the trash goes to a recycling unit, such as one in the two hundred in the Delhi Industrial Development Corporation (DSIDC), Narela. all the aforementioned plastics used for food packaging should ideally be coming from virgin plastic (so called because they come directly from crude oil from various gulf countries). Virgin plastic or Food Grade Plastic is the highest grade of plastic. The first unit visited by the Gobar Times team, Karan Plastics, buys it from a waste seller at Rs 17 a kg. Plastics are also shipped to India from countries like USA and Germany.
"The first stage of plastic recycling starts with the rag pickers or the kabadiwalas", explained J. B. Bansal, the owner of Karan Plastics. "Small ragpickers sell it to bigger ragpickers and so on til it reaches a recycling unit. We buy it from the second person and so get a lower rate."

Mr Bansal took us to the basement of his building which was not a usual one. There was a large amount of plastic lying there. Used plastics are cut into small pieces, melted and stretched into long strands by a huge machine called shredder and cut into small granules. We can add colour to the granules. They are melted in a liquid blower from which double sided plastic sheets comes out. It is then rolled in a roller. The workers place the rolls in a 'sealer' which finally seals and cuts into polybags. These are sold to wholesalers such as in Sadar Bazar. Bags are made from LD or Low Density plastics.

We followed Mr Bansal to another building. Here High Density or HD plastics was being recycled. About 10 workers sort through 2.5 metric tonnes of plastics per day. Bottles, baskets, toys... The plastics are first segregated by quality and then by colour. "Even if one bottle of a different quality gets mixed in a lot of 200 bottles, there would be serious problems for me", says Mr Bansal. The plastic is then chopped and washed with soda bicarbonate. The chopped plastic is then recycled into granules by the shredder.

"My ETP is just a tank filled with fresh water. We need a CTP which can take my waste water"
— Owner of a plastic recycling unit

Plastic recycling has been going on in India for the past 20-25 years.

"This is wonderful", you say, "now all the plastic that clutters and pollutes can be taken care of." the answer is that there is more than one drawback to recycling plastics. Toxins ae released into the air everytime plastic is recycled. This is not only harmful for the workers but for everyone who breathes air. The recycling plants use old, broken machines and ineffective techniques. You also would get stunned (as we did), when we asked Mr Bansal about the biggest problem he was facing. "The environment certificate we need to get from the Delhi Pollution Control is the biggest problem", he says with a straight face. Each of the units need to have an effluent treatment plant (ETP) but one owner says,"Narela is a big industrial area. It should have a 'functional' common effluent treatment plant (CTP) and all our waste water should go into it. It is very difficult to maintain individual ETPs. Right now I have a tank filled with fresh water where my ETP should be. "

What's more is that plastics can only be recycled five to ten times. after that the plastic has reached such a low quality it becomes worthless. And what happens then? It can't be recycled, it can't be reused and it won't decompose and disappear.

— Aditi Ghildiyal, Rachel Wenger, June Hwang

The chimpanzee who could say 'plastic'

This too!
As I was going through the various processes of plastics recycling, suddenly the pollution by plastics was no longer in my head. What seemed a bigger problem was human rights. When we asked a couple of workers sorting out the huge pile of waste, they did not answer. It was clear that they feared their supervisor, who was overlooking them. Afterwards we asked the supervisor how much they were paid. He said Rs 3500 a month. Personally I think this figure is false and they were paid around Rs 500 a month. Against the approximately 30 workers that I saw, there were about three children working. This brings up the topic of child labour. No worker in any country should have to work in the unsaniatry conditions that were present here.
— Dimitri Gunaratne

Bleak Future

Every morning, street children rummage through waste, searching for plastic bottles or bags. They are the ragpickers of Delhi. This is their way of earning a living; each piece of plastic is worth some money. If they look through rubbish for several hours a day, they can collect enough plastics to support themselves and their families. People who promote plastics, such as Mr Ratra from Indian Centre for Plastics in the Environment, argue that ragpickers are a positive element of the Indian society because they do a good job in segregating plastics and cleaning up the litter. Also, it is believed that it is a job that offers income to those of whom otherwise would be unemployed. However, is this really the case?

Waste workers at Connaught Place

Most importantly, ragpicking is illegal in Delhi. Also, although these young ragpickers may receive some money for the bottles they pick, the money they earn is only a momentary assurance. In order for them to have a better life than their parents, to extricate themselves from the street life, and to acquire security, they need education. Obviously, it is impossible for these children to learn anything when they spend most of their day delving into garbage.

According to Mr. Ratra, there is no problems with ragpicking because the children are happy for they can earn money and dealing with the waste becomes much more feasible. When a reporter asked why would anyone want to have a life of a ragpicker, he responded to the question by saying that "people are not equal". He claimed that there are different levels in society and people must accept the reality.

People are not equal and we must accept the reality
— Mr O P Ratra
Indian Centre for Plastics in Environment

It may be true that people are not equal in what they have, but that does not mean that they are not equal. Any child has the potential of growing up to be an esteemed and productive person when equal opportunities are given. Therefore, people must abandon their indifferent and selfish thoughts and realise that it is essential to ensure education and housing facilities for street children.

— June Hwang