FICCI Appeals More Attention on Single-Use Plastic Ban in Kerala

In the name of environment protection and eco-friendliness, FICCI Kerala State Council has appealed to the State Chief Minister to allot more time on a single-use plastic ban.

The time allotted for industry/traders was barely one month to switch over to the new alternative methods, is too inadequate especially due to several reasons, says Deepak L Aswani, Co-Chair, FICCI Kerala State Council.

Many of the plastic manufactures in the State are of the MSME categories and most of them avail bank loans to run their business. Hence, the sudden imposition of the ban would severely affect their existence. The raw materials and finished products which are already in stock valued in crores of rupees cannot be recouped and would be a total loss.

It is not practically possible to dispose of the available products completely within merely a month of receiving the notification. Better alternate packing materials without much increase in the price of the products need to be developed. Kerala being a consumer state, most of the products come from other states with the standard package which is used in the rest of the country, and the manufactures in certain cases need to work out a different package which would require some more additional time.

It also requested the Chief Minister to grant at least six months time, as the same would be of great help to them as the trade/industry are already severely affected by GST and the current economic recession in the country. The six month period can be effectively used for giving wide publicity to the ban of one-time usage of plastic items and best alternate products can be developed during the period to switch over to the biodegradable composite plastic or any other environmental friendly alternate materials.