Back to Blue is multi-year initiative from Economist Impact and The Nippon Foundation that aims to help organisations improve ocean health and sustainability. The first instalment of this initiative is the Plastics Management Index, which ranks 25 countries globally across 44 indicators organised into three categories: governance, systemic capacity, and stakeholder engagement.
The analysis for India reveals gaps and weaknesses throughout the ecosystem, from the collection system, to recycling and infrastructure, to collaboration on solutions. There is significant potential for further improvement.
Governance is India’s key plastics management weakness. Policy gaps exist at the central government level, and there is currently weak implementation and monitoring of existing policies. There is also a need to change consumer behaviour as awareness of the threat that plastic poses to the environment does not always translate into better practices on the ground. Granular data on plastic flows and on value change is patchy and not uniformly reliable. There is an immediate need to build on the present momentum and improve the level of commitment among large and small companies to reduce plastics waste.