Plastic was thought to be a boon, but it turned out to be a curse. What is plastic? It is lightweight, low-cost, durable, and has a wide variety of applications, ranging from a toothpick to an overhead water storage tank. Let us look at the advantages and disadvantages of plastics.

Plastic as a boon

Plastics have replaced metals, glass. Plastic pipes are not corroded by water. They are used in the manufacture of hundreds of domestic items such as boxes, bottles, toys, bags, pens, combs, buckets, toothbrushes, chairs, tables, TV/ radio cabinets, handles of a pressure cooker, frying pans.

Plastics form a part of almost all electrical appliances. It finds itself in automobiles and aircraft parts. We have become exceedingly dependent on plastics. It may be difficult to imagine our life with plastics.

Plastics as a curse

Plastic, though, seems a very useful material it can be very harmful as it produces harmful gases when it is burnt. Plastics are non-biodegradable, microbes cannot destroy them. They are harmful to the soil and take hundreds of years to decompose. Plastic bags thrown away carelessly on roads and other places find their way into drains and sewage pipes.

As a result drains and sewage pipes are clogged and the water spills on the roads. Animals, sometimes, feed on plastic bags and die painfully. Sometimes bags collected by rag pickers are also used after washing them. Use of such recycled plastic bags to keep food items could be harmful for our health.

Disposable syringes, drip bottles, blood bags, and other medical accessories when disposed of in an irresponsible manner, cause a lot of serious health problems. When plastic is burnt, it produces harmful fumes. We cannot eliminate plastic by burning it. Once manufactured it cannot be destroyed by any means. Even the manufacturing of plastics often creates a large number of chemical pollutants.

What can we do to minimize the overuse of plastics and deal with garbage?

� Avoid accepting plastic bags.
� Carry a paper or cloth or a jute bag when you go out for shopping.
� Don�t through waste food in plastic bags.
� Don�t store eatables in plastic bags.
� Use re-usable and washable plastic containers instead of disposable plastic bags to store food. Choose foods sold in glass jars.
� Avoid using plastic chairs and tables; you could use wooden or metal furniture.
� Don�t dispose plastics that can be recycled.
� Buy bulk cereals. Don�t buy food wrapped in plastic.
� Say �paper not plastic� at the grocery store.
� Plastic is made from crude oil. We can save crude oil if we minimize use of plastics.
� Use matches instead of plastic encased lighters.
� Make your family, friends, and others to follow proper practices for disposing of different kinds of wastes.
Go green and say No to Plastics.

Plastics- Think and Throw

You must have seen rag pickers sorting the garbage near your house and at roadsides. Do you know what do they collect? These rag pickers collect only those items from the garbage that can be sold. Whenever their bags are full of items, they take them to a kabari or junk dealer and sell them.

Waste is a subjective concept because items that some people discard, may have value for others.
�One Man�s Trash Is Another Man�s Treasure�. Some components of waste have economical value. It can be recycled once correctly recovered. If we try we can change some domestic wastes or useless items into something useful.

We can make-
� Files from old charts.
� Greeting cards decorated with flowers made from pencil shavings
� Mats from old clothes.
� Compost from vegetables and fruit wastes.
� Papier Mache masks and other beautiful items for giving as gifts to friends.
� Baskets from old polythene bags.
� Paintings from waste fibers, drinking straws, used foils, and broomsticks.
� Small size murals o walls using ceramic pieces.
� Kitchen napkins from old clothes.
� Memo pads out of scrap papers
� Minor repair works our self
� Recycled paper from old newspapers, discarded papers and magazines.

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