Mumbai, the city of dreams, is popularly known for it’s Bollywood movies, it’s famous vada pav and it’s undying spirit! People from all over India come here to fulfill their dreams and aspirations. While talking about Mumbai, we always talk about it’s huge, ever increasing population and this is always followed by the many problems this population is causing, one of the top most being waste!
Almost 7,800 MT of municipal waste is produced in Mumbai daily. The BMC works at its highest efficiency to handle this huge amount every day. But we are running out of space in our landfills and all this is because of a lacuna on our part, as citizens. We always play the blame game and shirk our responsibilities saying that “We can’t help it, the system is inefficient”. Au contraire, we as citizens lack on our part. We are always taught about the environment and saving the planet in school but we often don’t take our Mother Earth into consideration. Here’s a fun fact! Our planet isn’t the one that needs saving, it can handle itself. If anyone needs saving, it’s the human race! We have shunned our responsibilities for too long. It is time we stand up to our duties.
Now the question arises, HOW? We can start by segregation of the waste WE produce. The part where our system lacks the most is inefficiency in segregation resulting in everything being dumped in the landfills. 70% of the waste is biodegradable and most of the remaining waste like metals, plastic, paper etc. is recyclable. This means that if we segregate the waste properly, it can be managed more efficiently. This will significantly reduce the load on our landfills and our system can run smoother. Not just this, there will be a large impact on our economy. The cost for transportation will be reduced significantly. This money, which comes indirectly from our pockets, can then be used for better purposes than waste management!
All this can be possible if we start segregating our own waste that we produce at home. It’s time we stop thinking of this population as a problem and start seeing it as a strength that, when united, can create wonders!
