A day-long clean-up drive by the State Forest Department, Uttarakhand Environment Protection and Pollution Control Board and Dehradun based think-tank Gati Foundation, collected over 50% plastic trash along an attractive tourist destination in the hill-town of Mussoorie.
Present with his dedicated team, Anoop Nautiyal, Founder Gati Foundation said, “The focus of the cleanup was on the concept of Extended Producer Responsibility, which places the onus on manufacturers to take responsibility of the plastic generated during the entire lifecycle of the product, an important element of the Plastic Waste Management Rule 2016.”
The audit by Gati Foundation found brands such as Nestlé’s Maggi, Frooti and Appy Tetrapacks, ParleAgro’s, PepsiCo’s Lay’s as the top three majority of plastic waste. Other brands that were collected in the plastic brand-audit included Vadilal and Amul ice-cream wrappers, Britannia biscuit wraps, and Haldiram along with packets of chewing tobacco such as Dilbaag as well as half-used blister packs of pills, syrups, santiary pads, diapers and medicines.
The cleanup and audit at Company Garden was the beginning of The Himalayan Cleanup, a drive being simultaneously organized across 10 mountain States of India on one single day, as a run up to World Environment Day i.e. 5th June, with the theme for this year being #BeatPlasticPollution.
SDO Mussoorie, Neeraj Sharma who could be seen actively participating in the drive reiterated, “Awareness is the first move to changing things. The clean up drive is a step in that direction.”
The aim of the drive was to bring to the forefront the issue of plastic waste, and also to understand what is in our waste through a waste and brand audit.
