No Longer Going to Waste

Plastics constitute a growing threat to our environment - and in turn, human well-being - affecting the world’s freshwater systems and marine resources in particular, as well as terrestrial biodiversity and public health.

In India, where plastic use is rising, most cities and towns do not have an integrated solid waste management system.

This means that very little plastic waste is properly collected or disposed of, resulting in a massive waste-management challenge as cities continue to grow.

But in the central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh, waste collectors in two cities, Bhopal and Indore, are turning plastic waste into roads, as well as income for women.

A Plastic Waste Revolution

With the support of the Global Environment Facility's (GEF) Small Grants Programme (SGP), implemented by the United Nations Development Programme, a local NGO in India is working with municipal governments to develop a new system for plastic waste recycling.

The NGO, Sarthak Samudayik Vikas Avan Jan Kalyan Sanstha (SSVAJKS), has been working with waste collectors in Bhopal since 2008 to streamline plastic waste collection and sales to recyclers.

SSVAJKS initially developed a sustainable integrated waste management system for five wards in the city of Bhopal, which served as a model for the creation of a plastic waste management policy at the state level in 2011. This model has now been replicated in all states across India (and even onwards to Bangladesh).

This innovative model, now known as the ‘Bhopal model’, recycles and processes plastic and reuses it in the construction of roads, benefiting over two million people.

‘Ragpickers’ – the local term for such waste collectors - are individuals whose livelihood is picking over refuse in landfill sites or elsewhere to salvage goods and materials for recycling or reuse. They are mostly poor, illiterate, female, and come from socially marginalised castes, rendering them highly vulnerable.

Waste-pickers collect and then hand over the plastic waste to collection centres run by the municipal corporation.

The plastic waste is scanned and segregated, and most single-use plastics — which comprise half of all the plastic in this waste stream — are shredded and baled.

These bales are then taken for co-processing at cement kilns, or used to build roads.

It’s a win-win: not only do the waste-collectors - one of the more vulnerable cohorts in Indian society – double their wages, something useful is done with the plastic litter.

In 2010, in close collaboration with the municipal corporations of Bhopal and the Municipal Commissioner, SGP provided an initial grant that enabled SSVAJKS to conduct focussed interventions in five wards of Bhopal Municipal Corporation. Part of the interventions included organising waste-pickers into self-help groups (SHGs).

In 2014, SSVAJKS was awarded another SGP grant to mobilise more than 2,000 unorganised waste-pickers in 70 wards of Bhopal Municipal Corporation.

Lending Legitimacy

A crucial element of the project’s success was SSVAJKS’ partnership with urban municipal governments and local industries.

Through the self-help groups, the waste collectors - many of whom are socially marginalised and illiterate women - have been organised and trained in waste collection and recycling activities.

The majority of these waste collectors have been provided with municipal identity cards and uniforms through this project.

Improving their livelihoods and protecting the environment, these women contribute to the approximately 10 tonnes of plastic waste that are collected at five recovery centres in Bhopal every day, and then recycled by cement industries in and around the city.

By the end of 2016, 646 waste-pickers in Bhopal were organised into 42 self-help groups. More than 60 per cent are women, who earn a daily living from selling the plastic waste. In total, 40 members from the women’s self-help groups have also been trained in making bags out of used polythene, which are sold in exhibitions across India.

The success of the Bhopal work also led to the establishment of a pilot plastic recovery centre in Indore. As a result, ≈3,500 waste collectors have been organised into self-help groups in Indore.

Additionally, given the occupational hazards involved, SSVAJKS also conducted regular health camps, and over 850 waste collectors are now enrolled in health insurance schemes.