PUNE: Prominent milk selling brands in Maharashtra have urged the State government to first implement plastic-related laws for State owned milk brands Aarey and Mahanand and then expect others to follow the same.
The Maharashtra Milk Producers and Processors Association said it will follow government’s footsteps if this pilot project with Aarey and Mahanand is successful in curbing plastic menace.
The association’s members met representatives from the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) on Monday to request them to allot land where a plastic packet reprocessing plant can be set up to recycle used milk pouches.
Prakash Kutwal, the Secretary of Maharashtra Milk Producers and Processors Association, said, “There are more than 200 milk dairies in Maharashtra and we have decided to inform the Maharashtra government to first implement all rules and regulations along with the Extended Producers Responsibility (EPR) system with the government-run Aarey and Mahanand Dairy as a pilot project and if it proves helpful in curbing the milk pouches issue, we will follow their footsteps.”
“Every day, 10 lakh litres of milk is distributed in the city and around 12 tonnes of milk pouches are generated. Their collection is a difficult part. Therefore, we will request the State government to give licence to local milk distributors only if they agree to set up a collect back system. If this system is in place, then milk pouches collected back by local milk distributors will be given to us and we will then send those to reprocessing unit,” Kutwal added.
In a meeting with Dnyaneshwar Molak, head of Solid Waste Department, Kutwal said, a request for the availability of land for reprocessing plant of 15 metric tonne capacity somewhere near the city has been forwarded to the authorities.
GHOLE ROAD REPROCESSING PLANTS
The PMC is confident that in a month, two garbage reprocessing plants of four metric tonnes each at Ghole Road will start functioning.
“We have collected 70 metric tonnes of multilayer packaging in the last two months and have sent it to the Palghar plant,” Molak said.
