Mired in all the muck and grime littering the countryside is an opportunity for young, bright minds to come up with solutions to map and orchestrate the clean-up of Jamaica’s growing garbage pollution, in an environmentally friendly, sustainable and even economically sustainable way. That’s the informed view of Dr Parris Lyew-Ayee Jr, chair of the multistakeholder working group on Public Feedback on Plastic Packaging Materials.
Having heard from manufacturers of single-use plastic ‘scandal’ bags as well as other food-packaging material as well as environmentalists and others opposed to the indiscriminate dumping of plastics and Styrofoam, Dr Lyew-Ayee Jr is convinced that a straight ban on the use of these items is definitely not the route to go.
“It is in the exploration and examination of the issue that we realise that this situation is quite complex. There are options about you putting on a surcharge to make the customer pay more for plastic bags. We have to understand that this isn’t an uptown problem, that our people will happily pay more,” he told The Gleaner.
“The issue is that when margins are so low in the retail industry, if I jack up my prices and you have to pay $10 extra dollars for this plastic bag, then you’re just going to go to the man next door, who is not doing that. So it’s not as easy as simply just adding a surcharge in the realistic world of a poor country. The thing is that there are broader issues at play. It’s not just about incentivising people by charging them more. It’s a lot more complicated process,” Lyew-Ayee argued. Engaging young scientists to come with technologies to harvest and further process contents of the different waste streams is an avenue to explore.
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