The government has approved setting up of six plastic parks in different parts of the country.
These parks will have an ecosystem with state of the art infrastructure building and enabling the common facility to consolidate and synergize the capacities of the domestic downstream plastic processing industry.
These parks are located in Assam, Madhya Pradesh, Odisha, Jharkhand and Tamil Nadu.
This was stated by Chemicals and Fertilizers Minister DV Sadananda Gowda in a written reply in Rajya Sabha today.
He said, out of them, the plastic park at Tamot in Madhya Pradesh is functional.
Under the scheme, the government provides grant funding up to 50 per cent of the project cost. The remaining project cost is to be funded by State Government beneficiary industries and by a loan from financial institutions.
The Minister said, four new plastic parks have also been given in-principle approval for establishment in West Bengal, Haryana, Uttarakhand and Chhattisgarh.
In a written reply to a question in the Lok Sabha, Minister of State for Environment Babul Supriyo informed that the environment Ministry has issued Standard Guidelines on Single-use plastics to all Ministries and States for its extensive implementation.
The guidelines suggest about the action to be taken by the State governments for minimization of usage of single-use plastics. He said, considering the high environmental cost associated with the management of single-use plastics, Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced India’s pledge to phase it out by 2022.
Mr Supriyo also informed that on the call of the Prime Minister, a three-phase campaign Swachhta Hi Sewa was launched from 11th September this year which ended on 27th of October.
The Campaign focussed on awareness, collection and safe disposal of littered plastic.
He also informed that as per reports by States, 13 thousand 829 tonnes of plastic waste was collected and sent for environmentally sound recycling and about 1.23 lakh awareness activities were undertaken all over the country.
