The various plastics manufacturer's organisations put up a Full page Ad on the Economic Times today against the ban of Plastics polybags.

They are crying foul because the Maharastra government have made them a scapegoat, because the recent Floods might have been caused sewage blockage caused by solid waste.

They claim only 1% solid waste is plastics, and it was not plastics that caused the floods but the other 99%. Could be true.

Been a long time I have voiced my views. Lack of time, targets, corporate etc etc. Well today I am bit tired after reading all the work related documents.. I will let my mind wander to plastics..

I am sure they are right when they said that only 1% solid waste is plastics. And why not, plastic is so thin, if you presses them into a ball, the poly bag you used to carry 2-3 kilos of your grocery will be hardly the size of a peanut.

The plastic manufacturers cried that its just a matter of 1% and the sewage was clogged by the other 99%.

Oh! how I hate percentages.

They didn't mentioned that most of the 99% might be degradable, so it is more likely that the 1% waste have been staying for a long time and will add up to the next years sewage worth of 1% while parts of the other 99% might have been scavenged by ragpickers-animals-bacteria and other microbes in the same pecking order.

The consortium said that, plastics makes life much easier, so much more convinient.

Very true, I agree, why else would I use it despite having learnt in School and reading many a times that Plastics is Non-Biodegradable and once manufactured remains on the earth surface for a few generations.

They also said that they are preserving the forest by providing with a substitute for forest products. They will preserve the forest till the land is so full of plastics, the forest will suffocate to grow trees.

There are bamboo plantations in many parts of the country which are burnt to make way for new crops because the bamboo could not be harvested for lack of demand, logistics being another problem.

Do I see the making of a lobby, not unlike the Tobacco lobby of the USA, in the consortium.

Yes plastics might have constituted only 1% solid waste, but it can hold solid waste many times its size.

It would surprise me that 30-40% (just a number, this is not a researched figure) of the 99% solid waste are not held together by plastics.

A small polybag which might be less than a gram or a little more have many a times clogged my bathroom drainage. 1% of solid waste is a huge number, not forgetting the fact that the othet 99% might mostly be easily degradable waste.

Throw your leftover of of dals and vegetable and rice tied in a polybag and the polybag would be much less than 1% of the whole assemblage.

Like I said my views.. It is not a well researched write. I just plucked it off my Blog.

I don't know if we still use polybags in Manipur, but I do remember that it was once banned.

I hope we are ahead of the rest of the country in such things.