16-year-old wants to stop Amazon, Flipkart from excessive plastic use

Aiming to prevent Amazon and Flipkart from excessive plastic use in packaging, a 16-year-old boy has approached the National Green Tribunal (NGT). NGT is now seeking a report from the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) on minor's plea for directions to Amazon, Flipkart to stop excessive plastic use in packaging. Aditya Dubey, 16, has pleaded the NGT to direct Amazon and Flipkart to stop excessive use of plastics in packaging goods delivered by the firms, with the help of his legal guardian

"The e-commerce companies are covered under the Plastic Waste Management Rules, 2016. But due to a lack of monitoring and implementation, the respondents continue to use excessive amounts of plastic in wrapping and packaging their sold items," said the plea filed through advocates Meenesh Dubey and Divya Prakash Pande.

Dubey's plea argued that the companies deliver items in cardboard boxes, which are too large when compared to the size of the items being delivered.

"To ensure that the sold items do not move around in the out-sized boxes, they wrap the items in multiple layers of plastic sheets and plastic bubble wraps and thereafter fill the large empty spaces in the boxes with additional sheets of single-use plastic," it said.

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NGT seeks report from CPCB

A bench headed by NGT Chairperson Justice Adarsh Kumar Goel has posted the matter for hearing on January 3, 2020. Dubey's plea also said that though the home-delivery service of e-commerce companies have been very useful for consumers, they have given rise to serious environmental challenges due to excessive use of plastics in packaging. Once goods are delivered, the plastic waste is thrown away in the garbage and it ends up at landfill sites, leading to a burden on the earth and damaging the environment, it said.

"Single-use plastic has emerged as one of the biggest environmental challenges for our planet. It is cheap, useful, ubiquitous and very deadly. The fact that it's non-biodegradable and is recycled in very small percentages means that our plant is with passage of time is becoming a big dumping ground for single-use plastic. Single-use plastic breaks down into smaller fragments known as microplastics and then contaminates soil and water," the petition said.

Dubey said Amazon and Flipkart have not made any arrangements for either taking back the plastic material or ensuring that it is recycled.

"Plastic packaging constitutes 43 per cent of the total plastic waste generated in India and it is imperative that a direction be issued to the respondents that they should stop using plastic packaging materials and shift to environment-friendly packaging option, the plea said.

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(With PTI inputs)