Plastics: An Eco-villain or an Unsung Hero? – Multi-part series
1: Pakistans plastic bag match!
By: Ahsan Ejaz
The press conference today (16th July 2019) by Advisor to Prime Minister on Climate Change regarding banning plastic bags and replacing them with cotton bags is an Environmental disaster as well as an economic disaster.
According to a research undertaken by the Danish Environmental Protection Agency in February 2018 (Project No. 1985) organic cotton bags should be reused 149 times to counter for climate change as opposed to PE bags.
Whereas it would also be interesting to note that the plastic bags that the government has banned in Islamabad are, according to United Nations Environment Programme, the 6th most polluting source of plastic. The 5 preceding before are Cigarette Butts, Drink Bottles, Bottle Caps, Food Wrappers and finally Grocery Bags[1].
According to a research by Greenpeace[2], the 10 companies that are flooding the planet with throw away plastics are Coca Cola, Pepsi, Nestle, Danone, Mondelez International, Protecter & Gamble, Unilever, Perfetti van Melle, Mars Incorporated and Colagate-Palmolive. Interestingly none of these companies manufacture or use plastic shopping bags as their packaging.
Therefore it is of interest to note that why has the Plastic Shopping Bag been singled out when clearly its not the number 1 or second or third problem? Some say that plastic bags are the biggest source of visual pollution so my question to them is whether when someone is sick do we cure the symptoms or do we cure the disease?
Regarding the economic disaster, all plastic needed to manufacture carry bags is imported and tax revenue is collected at source. With a country that has a chronic problem of tax avoidance this is one of the few sectors where all raw material, which is 90% of the finished product, is taxed at source and income for the government.
As of late we have been hearing rumours from the corridors of power that we want to ban plastic just as Kenya has banned plastic bags. Just to put things in perspective, the population of Kenya is 49.7 million as opposed to ours 220 million. The GDP of Kenya is USD 74.94 billion versus Pakistan’s USD 305 billion. Fellow countrymen, Kenya had 176 plastic factories employing a total of around 3000 people. Punjab alone has 5000 plastic bag manufacturers employing 800,000 people (their employment feeds at least 4 million hungry mouths).
Instead of looking at Kenya should we not look at how our region is trying to overcome this challenge? UAE, Saudia and India all allow the use of the oxo-biodegradable technology to tackle the issue of littered plastic waste. The governments of these countries have been seeking assistance from professional researchers, scientists, academics and stakeholders. It seems unfortunately in Pakistan, we have been seeking assistance from Twitter & Facebook!
PAKISTAN ZINDABAD!
[1] United Nations – Environment Programme (https://www.unenvironment.org/interactive/beat-plastic-pollution/)
[2] GreenPeace (https://www.greenpeace.org/international/story/18876/these-10-companies-are-flooding-the-planet-with-throwaway-plastic/)
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