ISLAMABAD:The experts in environmental studies on Wednesday stressed the need for strong collaboration between the public and private sectors and a conducive legislative framework to reduce plastic use and shift to sustainable eco-friendly packaging.
They made theses remarks during a session on ‘Rethinking Plastics: Engaging Business Sector for a Circular Economy’ organised by Sustainable Development Policy Institute’s Network for Circular Economy here.
Addressing the session, Joint Executive Director, SDPI Dr Vaqar Ahmed, said highlighting the opportunities and challenges through success stories from private sector initiatives for plastic waste reduction could evoke the interest of the public sector in the area.
He called for reforms in the public procurement system by incentivizing SMEs and said that SECP was keen on conducting time-bound experiments to test financing mechanisms for such initiatives and startups.
Ahmed emphasised that SDPI could provide a platform to bridge SMEs and stakeholders for the promotion of green skills in this area.
Group Manager Sustainability, Packages Limited Ayesha Aziz, said that solutions to plastic packaging were expensive and there was a need to invest in research in Pakistan to reach cost-effective solutions. She urged for a collective effort from stakeholders including the private sector, consumers and the government.
Rija Tayyab, Roshan Packages stressed on involving large corporations as well as those at the grass-root level to create awareness by engaging students, academia and the community.
Hammad Haider, Metro Pakistan, said that his corporation through a strong community awareness campaign raised awareness on the harsh impacts of using plastic bags and had abolished single-use plastic packaging from their system.
He also informed that Metro had incentivized consumers by offering concessions on returning plastic waste at collection points at Metro.
Aniqa Arshad, Program Manager, FNF Pakistan urged producers to analyze their products and their individual components in terms of their bio-degradability, energy consumption and end-of-life management to translate circularity into practice.
Speaking at the event, Usman Manzoor, United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) highlighted various research and projects initiated by UNDP to reduce plastic consumption and waste. He empahsised the need to strongly collaborate with the public sector to bring about changes in practices while simultaneously duly considering the interests of the private sector. He also highlighted that the lower tier of public sector officials need to demonstrate more flexibility when it comes to new and novel ideas.
Anusha Fatima, Co-Founder, TrashIt termed segregated waste collection as “key to recycling and recovering plastic waste”. She emphasized that the most effective solution to plastic pollution was to turn off the tap of plastic, rather than add further to the system and switch to compostable, bio-degradable packaging.
Ali Syed, Founder of Ouroboros urged the government to include waste management and recycling in deliberations over climate issues and highlighted the financial limitations confronting the SMEs.