Mayor urged to take action against factories producing banned plastic items and shops selling them

Mayor urged to take action against factories producing banned plastic items and shops selling them

Mangalore Today News Network

Mangaluru, November 20, 2024: With banned single-use plastic items continuing to be sold and used in the city, some people who called up Mayor Manoj Kumar on Tuesday urged him to make Mangaluru free from such plastic products.

At the monthly phone-in event of the Mayor, Savitha Lobo from Ashoknagar and Jayaprakash from Yekkur questioned how shops are being allowed to sell the banned plastic items. Though the city corporation has legal powers to cancel the trade licences of such shops, they asked why the corporation is not taking action.

They said that the corporation should stop the source of those items. Action should be taken against factories, within the jurisdiction of the corporation, manufacturing banned plastic items.

Responding to it, the Mayor said that the corporation will raid such manufacturing units within a week.

The civic body, he said, has organised a programme on November 21 in its office to create awareness among all stakeholders to stop the use of banned plastic items. Manufacturers, shopkeepers, caterers, and others have been invited to the programme.

Meanwhile, the Plastic Waste Management Rules, 2016, as amended, provide the statutory framework and the prescribed authorities for enforcement of the rules, including ban on identified single-use plastic items. Identified single-use plastic items, which have low utility and high littering potential, were prohibited from July 1, 2022, vide Plastic Waste Management Amendment Rules, 2021.

Those plastic items are ear buds with plastic sticks, plastic sticks for balloons, plastic flags, candy sticks, ice- cream sticks, polystyrene [thermocol] for decoration; plates, cups, glasses, cutlery such as forks, spoons, knives, straw, trays, wrapping or packing films around sweet boxes, invitation cards, and cigarette packets, plastic or PVC banners less than 100 micron, stirrers.

The notification also prohibits manufacture, import, stocking, distribution, sale and use of plastic carry bags having thickness less than 75 microns with effect from September 30, 2021, and having thickness less than thickness of 120 microns with effect from the  December 31, 2022.