KOCHI: One day, I was cleaning the prawns, and I found a piece of plastic water bottle inside its stomach,” shares Sheena, a native of Vizhinjam. “For years, we have been struggling with plastic waste, often thrown in front of our houses in public spaces. So far, nothing has been done to segregate it,” she adds. But then, some help came for them all the way from Australia, through an NGO named Positive Change for Marine Life. They helped create awareness among coastal communities regarding the dangers of plastic waste.
Founded by Karl Goodsell, the NGO has been working with marginalised women from local households in Vizhinjam for a year now. They have been engaged in cleaning, sorting and segregating the plastic waste collected from the community. The first-of-its-kind, community-centric waste collection initiative has been able to reduce the plastic waste, and provide enough information to nip the issue in the bud.
The project has been implemented in two wards of Vizhinjam hosting over 150 families. Ward one has 10 units and ward two has 17. All the families were given collection bags, which are in turn collected from these households by four women from each unit. This waste is then handed over to the members of the NGO, who collect it once every week. The collected plastic waste is either sold to recycling units or used in composting and aquaponics systems.
“Plastic waste pollution has a widespread impact on marine life, which in turn affects human health. Before we gave the collection bags, they were dumping the waste in the sea, leading to pollution and affecting marine life. Things are different now,” said Krishna Kalidas, waste management and community outreach officer. “Initially, the people of the community were reluctant to participate. But now, more than 20 women are part of the project and have been actively involved in collecting plastic waste from the households,” he said.
The money raised by selling plastic bottles and paper to recycling units is also among the women from the community. “Our project not only aims to involve the local community in conserving the environment thereby making grassroot-level changes, but also empower the women in the community,” says Krishna.
“Due to the pandemic, we haven’t been able to collect plastic waste for a while. We plan to resume it once the cases come down,” he adds. Before the pandemic, the NGO collected plastic waste weighing up to 285 kg. Those not being upcycled or recycled are shredded in the machine built by Krishna, to make them useful for building aquaponics systems.