You’re listening to part 2 of my conversation with Pranshu Singhal where we’ll delve into the realities of e-waste management in India.
Pranshu is on a relentless mission to enable setup of a well governed industry ecosystem for e-waste management in India.
He founded Karo Sambhav which is a cohesive movement for enterprises, consumers, governments and alliances to collaborate and enable circular economy.
Show Notes:
- What does formalizing informal sector mean? - Today we need one-common definition of formalization for everyone to follow.
- Suggestions for EPR amendments;
- How do we improve & create a level playing field for producers and PROs. We need to reverse the current situation; Instead of having negative pressure on orgs doing good, we should have positive pressure on orgs not doing so good.
- We need to digitize our whole system of data management in waste. Today most data on the next life of recycled waste is being submitted in paper format, which makes it difficult to carryout data analysis unlike other industries.
- As of today the responsibility for enforcement of EPR lies on state pollution control board (which are only a group of few people) which is a lot of work expected from a handful individuals. Present mechanics of enforcement make it difficult to achieve success on good intentioned policies. Instead can we involve technology & management institutions for regular monitoring in the form of yearly assignments;
- OR can we create an open source platform with these data sets, which will enable any of the interested parties to get involved, analyze and suggest solutions. Having this open source platform is beneficial because it will help us identify challenges from multiple view points globally. Once challenges are identified only then change can happen.
- Another challenge with today’s EPR system is to know what kind of money is being spent by brands / recyclers / (stakeholders in the system). It is important to have publications of reference costs of compliance. This will eradicate the vicious cycle of lowest cost models. Consider that a brand has to comply to a new regulation in the policy, if there are no reference costs of compliance, they’ll always opt for the low cost service providers, without even knowing whether the service provider is competent to provide quality results, as there is no client reference. Having reference costs equips the well intentioned brands to negotiate better and be ware of low quality service providers, because for them EPR and sustainability is more than just a tick in the box.
- Today in EPR systems, there is a race to the bottom (in terms of prices)
- We need to bring in mechanisms by which enforcements are no longer bottlenecks to the growth of the system.
Tune into the episode to learn more.
Contact: Karo Sambhav
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Key words : E-waste recycling
