Mumbai:

The Bombay High Court on Wednesday sought to know why plastic flowers were not included in the list of single-use plastic items banned by the Union government.

A division bench of Chief Justice Alok Aradhe and Justice Bharati Dangre asked if the Centre thought that plastic flowers could be recycled, or are biodegradable.

The HC was hearing a petition filed by the Growers’ Flower Council of India (GFCI) seeking a direction to the Centre to prohibit the use of plastic flowers.

“Is the Union government sure that plastic flowers can be recycled, or that they are biodegradable? They are so flimsy. Can they be recycled?” the court asked, referring to the Centre’s affidavit stating that these flowers were not in the list of banned items.

The bench referred to a notifications issued by the Union government which stated that single-use plastics which cannot be recycled, or are not biodegradable, are banned. “Are you sure plastic flowers cannot be included in this list?” the bench asked.

The court directed the petitioner organisation to file an affidavit in response to the Centre’s stand in two weeks.

The petition claimed that the maximum thickness of plastic flowers used for decoration is usually 30 microns. Various notifications issued by both central and Maharashtra governments prohibit the production, stocking, distribution and sale of single-use plastic items including ones which are less than 100 micron thick, it said.

The notifications do not specifically mention plastic flowers. The government should ban plastic flowers with less than 100 micron thickness, the petition said.

The website of the Growers’ Flower Council of India describes it as an “association of independent growers, exporters of cut-flowers and ornamentals, input suppliers, florists, wedding decorators and each beneficiary in the chain of flower consumption by end users”.

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Plastic waste piled outside an illegal recycling factory in Jenjarom, Kuala Langat, Malaysia October 14, 2018. Picture taken October 14, 2018.
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Malaysia’s trade ministry said it has imposed provisional anti-dumping duties on imports of polyethylene terephthalate, or PET, originating or exported from China and Indonesia.

The anti-dumping duties range from 6.33% to 37.44% and took effect on January 7, 2025, the trade ministry said in a statement late on Tuesday.

New research published in the journal Nature has said that India is responsible for around one-fifth of global plastic emissions of around 9.3 million metric tonnes (Mt) per year.

The rate places India at the top of the emitters’ list, whereas the study places China, generally considered to be the greatest committer, fourth.

Plastic emissions includes materials that have moved from controlled systems for waste, however basic, managed or mismanaged, to the environment where they are under no control.

According to the study, conducted by researchers at the University of Leeds, plastic emissions are highest in southern Asian, sub-Saharan African, and southeast Asian countries.

It estimated Nigeria produces 3.5 Mt of plastics per year, ahead of Indonesia with 3.4 Mt/year and China with 2.8 Mt/year.

“Previous studies highlighted China as a high plastic polluter because they used much older data on the country’s waste management” researcher and study co-author Ed Cook told The Hindu. “However, in the last 15 years, China has improved its waste management substantially and is approaching a point where it has a comprehensive collection system. Remember that China is fast approaching high-income group status and more monetary resources than India.”

India’s plastic problem

India has emerged as one of the world’s largest plastic polluters for several reasons, according to Cook. “Firstly, there is a large and increasing population which is becoming more affluent. That means more and more waste, and the country has struggled to keep pace with providing waste management services. In a way this is a typical situation seen in other countries, but it is more pronounced in India because of the large number of people.”

Dumping sites in the country are home to uncontrolled land disposal and outnumber sanitary landfills 10 to 1. The country’s official waste generation rate, estimated to be 0.12 kg per capita per day, is possibly underestimated while waste collection is overestimated, the study noted.

While India claims to have a national waste collection coverage of around 95%, the study found evidence that official statistics don’t include rural areas, open burning of uncollected waste, and waste recycled by the informal sector.

Data used in the study indicates collection average of 81% for India.

Around 5.8 Mt of plastic solid waste is openly burned each year in India.

Other findings of the study

Researchers used machine learning to develop an inventory of macroplastics that pollute the environment from 50,702 municipalities based on five land-based sources: uncollected waste, littering, collection system, uncontrolled disposal, and rejects from sorting and reprocessing.

Around 69%, or 35.7 Mt, per year of the world’s plastic waste comes from 20 countries, four of which are low-income (LIC), nine are lower-middle-income (LMC), and seven are upper-middle-income (UMC), the study paper said.

High-income countries have higher plastic waste generation rates but none are ranked in the top 90 polluters, mostly due to 100% collection coverage and controlled disposal.

Despite lower plastic waste generation rates in LICs, LMCs, and UMCs, a large part of it is either uncollected or disposed of in dumping sites, contributing to uncontrolled disposal.

The study also reported more plastic waste is burned than is emitted as debris (physical particles larger than 5 mm) worldwide, which may have a significant impact on human health and ecosystems.

Shortcomings in local and national waste management systems are more evident on a per-capita basis. For example the study found China to be the world’s fourth-largest absolute emitter but 153rd on a per-capita basis. Similarly, India ranked 1 but 127th per capita. Russia on the other hand is the world’s fifth-largest absolute emitter but also has high per-capita emissions, reportedly due to low levels of controlled disposal.

In the Global South, uncollected waste is the largest contributor to plastic pollution. It accounts for 68% of all plastic waste emissions and 85% of all debris emissions, the study estimated. According to the researchers, no other global plastic pollution models explicitly identify uncollected waste as the main source of pollution. Mostly, this is clubbed with “mismanaged waste”.

In high-income countries, littering is the largest source of plastic emissions, accounting for 53% of debris emissions and 49% of all plastic emissions in the Global North.

Mismanagement of rejects from plastics sorting and recycling systems in both Global North and Global South adds around 1 Mt/year of plastic waste emission to the environment, thus showing that it is a comparatively small emissions burden even though it has previously been the focal point of research in the field.

Pointing a way forward

The study said it aimed to create a global inventory of macroplastic pollution at local levels to inform policies designed to reduce plastic emissions and to provide a global baseline for researchers monitoring emissions.

An inventory like this can prove critical to the success of the United Nations’ Plastics Treaty, a draft resolution that negotiators are hoping to turn into an international legally binding agreement by the end of this year. Once finalised, this agreement will aim to end plastic pollution.

The fifth session of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee (INC-5) to develop the agreement is scheduled to take place in Busan, South Korea, from November 25 to December 1, 2024.