Two decades ago the Perandoor Canal was a sight to behold. Children scouted along its bank hunting for crabs, awed by the sight of jelly fish floating in the water. Kingfishers kept their vigil on the trees close by to swoop down at the first sight of fresh catch. Pearlspots and catfish somersaulted in the water that swiftly made its way into the backwaters. Today, one cannot step close to the canal owing to the stench and filth that has been dumped into it, let alone, spot a crab. ‘Waste’ in every sense of the word is brimming in the Perandoor, be it from households, hospitals or industrial effluence.
This is just one instance of what has become of a beautiful water body thanks to senseless and unethical dumping of waste. With the onset of the monsoon, water logging becomes a serious issue. The polluted water the overflows onto to the roads and homes adjacent to the canal posing serious health hazards. Illegal encroachments, silting, weed growth and lack of maintenance have taken its toll on the canal. Is there a way that Perandoor canal can redeem its former glory? If yes, where do we start?
The 3 Rs- Reduce, Reuse and recycle- is the only mantra by which waste can be managed. Plastic, the biggest culprit tops the list of non-biodegradable waste as it doesn’t disintegrate by itself. Low quality plastics leach toxic chemicals especially when heated and pose potential health risks. “There are around 10-30 loads of plastic waste that come in everyday. Even though there are many proposals to recycle plastic such as a waste incinerator that coverts waste to energy, currently there is no plastic recycling system in place to handle such large amounts of waste. A conscious effort to say ‘No’ to plastic is definitely the need of the hour,” says Krishnakumar, Junior Health Inspector, Kochi Corporation. Simple gestures, like using paper packaging or jute bags whenever possible, reducing the use of plastic glasses, plates, spoons and forks or refilling packaged water instead of buying new ones each time can take us a long way.
“Segregation is most important”, says the Recykler, a socio – economic organisation that collects used paper and plastic from across 150 apartments across Kochi. As a first step, waste should be segregated into plastic, organic, glass and paper. Once this is done then waste management becomes easier. “Used plastic and paper is collected every 60 days, right from your doorstep, for as much as Rs.8/kg of plastic and Rs. 7/kg of paper. The key point to bear in mind is that the plastic needs to be clean if it have to be recycled”, says the Recykler. If each of us choose to recycle used plastic rather than adding to the pile, Kochi will be a cleaner city. “Plastics of any kind, broken buckets, shopping bags, bottles, milk covers etc are collected from households, sorted and sent for recycling,” says Ullas of Salmiya Traders, Palarivattom. It’s just a matter of finding such takers in each locality.
CREDAI, an NGO initiated the ‘clean city movement’ in 2007 is doing good work in this field. “More than 65,000 families across Kerala are currently using the services of CREDAI. Plastic waste collected from apartments is shredded into bits at the Ravipuram centre and the end product is sent for recycling or for use in tarring roads. Bio-bins at these apartments convert organic waste into organic fertilizers using the aerobic microbial compost system. Apart from awareness programmes that are conducted , training is provided for the staff on standard procedures,” says Joby Jacob of CREDAI, Kochi. The compost thus produced can be used in gardens or small vegetable patches in the apartments.
By using creative and imaginative ideas, plastic waste can be remodelled into functional and charming masterpieces. Children need to be educated and trained to throw waste only in bins and to save resources as much as possible, be it water, fuel, electricity, paper, trees or even food. They need to be made aware of the dangers of pollution and the need for 3 R’s right from childhood. Perandoor can regain its lost glory but only if we choose to do so.
