Plastic ban fails to bag federal capital

Pak-EPA chief says teams formed to ensure implementation of the ban

ISLAMABAD: While the federal capital celebrated freedom from British rule with zeal, the city failed to fully win back its freedom from the vicious grip of plastics, with polythene bags seen trading hands and dangling from the hands of shoppers in various markets of the federal capital on Thursday.

The government had imposed a complete ban on polythene bags in the federal capital from August 14. Announcements in this regard have been made over the past few months by the district administration, the environmental agencies and even the top government officials including the Advisor to the Prime Minister on Climate Change Amin Aslam and Minister of State for Climate Change Zartaj Gul Wazir.

But in the absence of introducing feasible alternatives, the authorities have failed to halt the trade and use of plastic bags.

Plastic bags banned at all airports across the country

Plastic bags continued to be in use in the federal capital on Thursday, a day after the ban was supposed to have gone into effect.

Meanwhile, the chief environment body in the federal capital, the Pakistan Environmental Protection Agency (Pak-EPA) Director General (DG) Farzana Altaf told The Express Tribune that they have formed four teams to ensure implementation of the ban on polythene bags.

“People will see action very soon,” Altaf said, adding that the Pak-EPA teams will be comprised of officials from the environment watchdog, the Climate Change Ministry, the Capital Development Authority (CDA), the Islamabad Municipal Corporation (IMC) and the Islamabad Capital Territory (ICT) administration.

These teams, the Pak-EPA chief said, will raid stores across the city.

Noting that the action will be phase-wise, Altaf said that in the first phase, they will target the wholesalers of plastic bags in a bid to cut off the supply of plastic bags to markets.

Thereafter, she said that a special campaign has been devised and launched by the Prime Minister House which will sensitise the public about the hazards of polythene bags so that they can be eradicated with the public’s support.

Businesses urged to find substitutes for plastic bags

The idea for banning plastics from the federal capital was raised in a meeting of a Senate panel in February. Later, it was backed by the Climate Change Ministry.

In July, the federal cabinet approved a motion to ban the use of plastic bags in ICT.

A Statutory Regulatory Order (SRO) to ban plastic bags in the ICT was supposed to come into force from August 14 which allowed the conditional use of polythene bags for specific purposes such as industrial packing, primary industry packing, municipal packing, hospital waste and hazardous waste after due permission from the competent authority

After the cabinet’s decision, Aslam had said argued that “Around 80 per cent of the drains across the country are choked due to plastic bags and are a potential cause of urban flooding and various diseases among the masses.”

The River Indus is now the second most plastic polluted river in the world, behind only the Yangtze River in China, according to a study by the German Environmental Research Center Helmholtz.

Ban on plastic bags on cards 

Wazir had suggested introducing a tax on the use of plastic bags ranging from Re1 to Rs2 to discourage the use of toxic plastic as part of their ban. Moreover, the government – to do its part – has claimed to have banned the use of single-use plastics from the Climate Change Ministry, the Ministry of Housing and Works and the Senate.

Separately, the Islamabad High Court (IHC) had in August refused to grant a stay order on the imposition of the ban. The ban had been challenged by plastic bag manufacturers claiming that ban imposed on the manufacture, import, sale, purchase, storage and usage of plastic bags in the federal capital by the Pak-EPA was unconstitutional because it violated their basic rights.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 16^th, 2019.