By Ifham Nizam

The Environment Ministry would ban six plastic-based products from today(31), subject Minister Mahinda Amaraweera said yesterday, adding that the present government had taken steps to tighten laws on materials that cause environmental and health-related problems.

The Minister said that disposable polythene and plastic, PET bottles (Polyethylene Terepthalate), lunch sheets, less than 20 microns, sachets (non-food and non-pharmaceutical), and air-filled plastic toys were the six items that would be banned from production.

Amaraweera, however, said that considering the requests made by several companies, the relevant products which had already been manufactured would be given a short period of three months to be marketed and no restrictions had been imposed on the export of those products.

According to the Environment Minister, the companies were entirely local and some industrialists were aware of the ban but had even imported and installed new equipment to manufacture such items.

One of the companies had decided to send the newly imported equipment back to the country from where it was imported, he added.

Production here will be banned of those six products from today and the items which are currently on sale in the shops could be sold at the earliest.

No such sales outlets would be subjected to inspection. However, the Central Environmental Authority (CEA) would conduct periodic factory inspections to determine whether the banned items were continuing to be manufactured for local use. About 5.9 percent of urban solid waste collected daily is polythene and plastic, a senior official said.

“We collect about 400 tonnes of plastic and polythene daily in the country. The use of PET bottles is estimated to be around 1,250 tons per month. Of this, only 250 tons is recycled,” Amaraweera added.

However, total plastic recycling in the country is about 15-20 percent of the total plastic waste.

An Environment Ministry study indicated the amount of plastic waste incinerated per day was 232 tons. Some 300,000 tons of plastic raw materials were imported into the country and a large quantity of finished goods were also imported. About 30 percent of plastic is re-exported as finished goods. About 24 percent of total imports are recycled.