By : Francis Khongwar
Shillong(Meghalaya ), April 13 : Plastic bottles are making life much easier because they are lightweight, durable and hard to break. A plastic bottle is the best way to contain and carry all kinds of liquid ranging from water and soft drink to oil for cooking. The plastic bottles are of great invention. But they also have their own disadvantages especially in polluting the environment.
In recent years all the plastic bottles and other plastic wastes here find their way in Umiam Reservoir.
Some people residing at Mawmih area at the edge Umiam Reservoir have made a profitable business in the recent past by using boats to collect all the plastic wastes before selling them to the Byrnihat Industrial Estate for recycling.
This trend is now being reversed, as rag pickers collect them in sacks and sell them to the mini-domestic industry in the city. It is of utter surprise to find the operation of a hydraulic plastic bottle machine at Mawlai Phudmawri locality in Shillong. Thousands of used plastic bottles collected from the city of Shillong find their way in the Mini Cottage Industry.
These plastic bottles are crushed by a heavy metal compressor and in a few minutes are flattened like plastic bags and mechanically bound by aluminum wires into bundles of crushed plastic bottles. When the stock is sufficient, they are loaded into the trucks for recycling in the Byrnihat Industrial Estate in Ri Bhoi District of Meghalaya. People here say that this is the most creative way to protect the environment.
