Why innovation is needed to battle wild wild waste

(From left) Amit Chandra, honorary chairperson, governing council, Harsh Mariwala, founder, and Dr Raghunath Mashelkar, governing council member and chairperson emeritus of Marico Innovation Foundation, which is working with 15 startups to help them create scale and impact Image: Madhu Kapparath

India’s plastic consumption and waste generation have both increased dramatically over the past five years. While consumption was at 19.8 million tonnes in 2019-20, and growing at a CAGR of 9.7 percent, waste generation is at 3.4 million tonnes up from 1.6 million tonnes in 2016-17 and growing at a CAGR of 20.7 percent, says the Marico Innovation Foundation’s (MIF) ‘Innovations in Plastics: The Potential and Possibilities’ report. Of the total 3.4 million tonnes waste generated, only 30 percent is recycled, the rest finds its way into landfills.

It has been 150 years since plastics came into being, but today they are practically irreplaceable. In such a situation, what’s the way around? “Plastics have now become one of the largest issues. On one hand, we cannot do without it, but on the other, the rate at which we are consuming it… we have reached a stage where we just cannot sustain it,” says Amit Chandra, honorary chairperson, governing council, MIF and chairperson, Bain Capital India. A disruptive solution is the need of the hour. If there is one place where the lack of an effective recycling plan is most visible, it is the towering waste landfills in India. 

Involving key stakeholders

The goal is to turn into a circular economy—focussing on eliminating waste and reusing products and materials, for which every stakeholder—civil society, the government and the private sector—needs to be involved. “I think this needs to get attention from all the stakeholders and it needs a lot of collaboration because if all the stakeholders work unitedly, only then will we feel the impact,” says Harsh Mariwala, founder, MIF. The foundation is working with close to 15 different startups, to help them scale up and create a large scale impact.

But when it comes to implementation of changes for a sustainable future, Chandra says, “it needs an enabling policy framework”. For instance, he adds, “If you look at recycling, today there is no incentive for me to dump one trash can versus five or for me to segregate my waste. Put a cost on consumers for dumping garbage.” Though the government has taken initial steps for single-use plastics, Mariwala feels, “it needs to play a far more proactive role, such as introducing landfill taxes”.