In the first article on this topic, I left you with one suggestion “Start segregating your waste” Let’s discuss waste in little more detail. What kind of waste do we all generate ? It can be divided into three/four broad categories. One is the waste that is generated from our kitchens and plants. For example: Fruit and vegetable peels, egg shells, tea leaves, plant cuttings etc. This is termed as wet waste. This is also called bio degradable waste because this can easily be converted into compost for our plants.
The other category of waste is dry waste, that comprises paper, cardboard, plastic, glass , metal etc. A lot of this dry waste can be recycled and reused only if sorted properly.
There is yet another kind of waste that needs a category of its own because of its nature. And that’s e-waste. All types of electrical and electronic equipments that are discarded for whatever reasons are called e-waste. Some examples of this would be fridge, TV , mixers, vaccum cleaners mobiles, computers etc.
These need to be handled extremely carefully because they contain toxic chemicals that can be hazardous for human beings.
Another category of waste is the Sanitary waste, comprising of all those items that contain any type of body fluid. One example of this would be diapers. This type of waste should be handed out separately to the garbage collector, wrapped in a newspaper and marked with a cross in red color. This makes for easy identification of this waste. Even the MCD garbage collection vans have a separate compartment for this type of waste.
Those who are already doing this kind of segregation really need to be applauded. And those who are not, need to be encouraged and supported to start segregation. In the next issue, I will talk more about the dry waste that we generate. Feel free to get in touch with me for any queries on the subject.
