Parliament should be made plastic free: Sherry

The Parliament should be made plastic free by imposing a ban on plastic made material in the premises as recycling of the material is an important issue which requires political will and policy interventions to ensure its process.
The Climate Change Caucus on Tuesday proposed this to Ministry of Climate Change during a meeting here in the Parliament House. The meeting of the Caucus was held in the chair of Senator Sherry Rehman.
In its meeting, the Caucus discussed implementation of the Basel Convention and other key issues pertaining to Pakistan's capacity to comply with it. Rehman proposed to make the Parliament plastic free by imposing a complete ban on the plastic made material, adding that this will send a strong message to the masses about commitment of the parliamentarians to deal with the issue.
The National Assembly was informed in December last year that Pakistan has been using around 55 billion plastic shopping bags each year while the use is on the rise at the rate of 15 percent per annum. There are about 8,021 production units in the country with average production capacity of 250-500 kilograms per day and majority of them are cottage industry.
Plastic bags take much longer time to degrade (non-biodegradable) as under the best circumstances high density polyethylene will take more than 20 years to degrade, while approximately, 1, 60,000 people are directly and 600,000 people are indirectly dependent on this industry.
The Caucus called upon the ministry to put forward recommendations to curtail use of plastic and chart a way forward to phase out the excessive use of plastic. Members of the Caucus underlined the need for a strong linkage between the federal and provincial governments to make joint efforts for discouraging excessive use of plastic.
Minister of State for Climate Change Zartaj Gul informed the group that there is a proposal under consideration to impose more taxes on plastic; however, the Caucus proposed that the ministry should take steps for creation of awareness among the masses about the hazardous effects of reused plastic material.
The minister said that Caucus is doing an important job and the ministry will extend all possible support to make concrete recommendations. Rehman said that climate change is an issue which has put Pakistan and the region at risk and that it is high time to take tangible steps to make all inclusive comprehensive policies on mitigating climate stress.