VIJAYAWADA: Despite the Vijayawada Municipal Corporation (VMC) having announced a ban on plastic carry bags, which are less than 50 microns from January 1, several traders and fruit vendors on Besant Road and One Town are packing commodities in bags made of the non-biodegradable substance.
‘’If we refuse to give plastic carry bags to customers, they will make purchases at outlets that do. It will be hard for us to stop using plastic bags,’’ R Raju, the owner of a departmental store in One Town told TNIE.
According to information available with civic body officials, 30 per cent of the municipal solid waste generated per day is plastic i.e. 150 tonnes of the total of 550 tonnes.
After the Centre revised the Plastic Waste Management Rules to include anti-plastic measures, the VMC in September 2016 passed a resolution to impose a total ban on the procurement, storage and sale of all kinds of plastic and non-woven polypropylene carry bags under the ambit of the VMC beginning 2018.
‘’Till date, the VMC has not given any guidelines on how to pack goods if plastic carry bags below 50 microns can’t be used,’’ said the owner of a grocery shop near Governorpet. “What can we do if plastic carry bags available in the market are less than 50 microns? If VMC wants to implement the rule, an alternative solution needs to be figured out,” he fumed. Civic officials TNIE spoke to said they had conducted surprise inspections at Governorpet, Besant Road and Gandhi Nagar to curb the sale of plastic carry bags.