New Delhi: Researchers say – if all plastic bottles we as humans use in a year were to stack up on top of each other, then one will be able to travel to the moon and back 10 times. Add to it the humongous amount of plastic bags, plates, basically everything we consumed now. Talking about India, according to a 2016 report by the Central Pollution Control Board, our country is responsible for generating over 4,354 tonnes of such non-biodegradable waste every day. And, that’s enough to fill over seven Airbus A380 aircraft—the world’s largest passenger airliner.
A 2017 study published in Environmental Science & Technology, a global journal stated that three of the world’s ten rivers which carry 90% of plastic to the world’s oceans are in India – the Indus, the Ganga and the Brahmaputra. Moreover, India is also the 12th biggest plastic polluter in the world. As the adverse effects of plastic consumption continue to grow and choke our planet, as citizens, the need of the hour is to switch to green alternatives and adopt the -friendly way of living.
Also Read: ‘There Is A Lot You Can Do With Waste’: Startups In India Giving A Unique Spin To Waste Management
How Can We Help As Citizens
We as citizens can help the planet by swapping simple everyday plastic items with green alternatives. Imagine when 1.2 billion citizens swap at least one plastic product with an eco-friendly item, the earth will surely become a nice place to live.
Also Read: Goodbye Plastic, Hello Creativity: Five Easy Ways To Reuse Plastic Bottles
The eco-friendly alternatives are available online, e-retail stores and there are numerous vendors helping people make this green change – from organisations such as Ecoware (for plastic cutlery), Astu Eco (for plastic cutlery), HeyDay (Sanitary napkins), Saathi (Sanitary napkins), Pappco (Straws and other daily utility items), to name a few.
If you are just getting started on your green journey to give up on plastics, here are some simple everyday alternatives to consider.
NDTV – Dettol Banega Swachh India campaign lends support to the Government of India’s Swachh Bharat Mission (SBM). Helmed by Campaign Ambassador Amitabh Bachchan, the campaign aims to spread awareness about hygiene and sanitation, the importance of building toilets and making India open defecation free (ODF) by October 2019, a target set by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, when he launched Swachh Bharat Abhiyan in 2014. Over the years, the campaign has widened its scope to cover issues like air pollution, waste management, plastic ban, manual scavenging and menstrual hygiene. The campaign has also focused extensively on marine pollution, clean Ganga Project and rejuvenation of Yamuna, two of India’s major river bodies.
