The Union Water and Sanitation Ministry has advised all the Central Ministries to minimise the use of packaged plastic water bottles and utilise other alternatives like steel and glass tumblers or water purifiers and filters in their official meetings to curb the increasing plastic waste menace.
Ministry’s Joint Secretary Saswati Prasad has recently written to all the Ministries in this regard. Underlining that charity begins from home, he said that his Ministry has already stopped using bottled water during official functions.
“I request you that use of bottled drinking water in official meetings, conferences, workshops etc including those conducted by subordinate offices and PSUs may be avoided by making alternative arrangements for safe drinking water that does not result in plastic waste generation,” Prasad said in the letter.
Plastic bottled water is being widely used in all the Ministries. In fact, some Ministries have been serving small-sized water bottles to visitors also, leading to misuse of precious water resources besides piling up the environmentally hazardous waste plastic bottles causing burden on landfills.
The Joint Secretary told The Pioneer that the initiative is the part of the Swachchh Bharat Mission. “It’s time that the Ministries take green initiatives and lessen the burden on environment. If Sikkim can restrict plastic bottle usage then why can’t we at the Centre,” he said.
For effective waste management in an eco-friendly manner, the Sikkim Government last month issued notification restricting the use of mineral water bottles in departmental meetings and functions.
“Therefore, in order to reduce creation of garbage in the form of used drinking water plastic bottles it is notified that the packaged drinking water bottles may not be used during any Government meetings or functions,” said the order signed by Sikkim Chief Secretary Alok K Shrivastava.
It suggested that as an alternative, departments can use filtered water or water from large reusable water dispensers or reusable water bottles in Government functions. Incidentally, Bihar had last year itself banned packaged plastic water bottles in its departments’ meeting. Bihar’s Chief Secretary Anjani Kumar Singh had directed the heads of all Government departments to follow it strictly in meetings, events and seminars organised by them.
Officials have been directed to serve purified water using steel tumblers and glasses. States like Himachal Pradesh have banned plastic packaging for junk food. Himachal Pradesh had also banned polythene bags below 40 micron in 2011.
Non-biodegradable waste not only chokes the sewage, but also adversely impacts the environment. Bisphenol A (BPA) chemical is used in making PET bottles.