'Industry has to worry about e-waste'

The growth of the IT sector and increasing demand for consumer electronics goods have no doubt raised India's status as a spender on technology, but simultaneously these are posing a bigger challenge as to how to manage the electronic waste (e-waste).

According to industry sources, India generates around 40 tonnes of electronic waste every hour, against about 4,000 tonnes of e-waste generated per hour worldwide. This may not be much but the situation is aggravated by the fact that there are few formal re-cycling units for e-waste products in India which work to proper standards.

According to Subrato Bagchi, founder member and chief operating officer of MindTree Consulting, the need of the hour is changing the mindset of the people and industry. "What is needed now is awareness, activism and action on how to manage e-waste," he said. If e-waste were not recycled properly, these could be hazardous to human health.

Bagchi was addressing the inaugural session of a seminar on e-waste management on Thursday. Representatives of about 50 companies, non-profit organisations and IT industries are participating in the two-day seminar organised by The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI), in collaboration with the European Union.

Appealing for environmentally-responsible recycling of e-waste in India, Bagchi said, "Let TERI come out with the suggestions taking inputs on EU best practices and put these on web for the public." "MindTree is prepared to fund publishing these in regional languages to be part of school curriculum," he added.

According to sources in TERI, apart from IT and consumer equipment, the biggest generators of e-waste in India include household appliances, lighting equipment, electrical and electronic tools, toys, medical devices, monitoring and control instruments, and automatic dispensers.

"Computer equipment, which is a complicated assembly of over 1,000 components, comprises of hazardous elements like lead, cadmium, chromium and mercury. Unless, recycled properly, this will have a toxic effect on human beings," V Krishna of TERI said.

Giving an example of Japan, where customers need to pay a certain amount towards recycling consumer products at the time of purchase, Krishna said that such rules should be adopted in India too. There was a need to bring out separate legislation on e-waste.

D C Sharma of Central Pollution Control Board, central zone said, e-waste in the Indian context did not come under hazardous elements. However, since most of the electronic and electrical products were full of hazardous stuff, recycling should be done in a safe manner. He said that informal recyclers need to register themselves with the CPCB and conduct recycling as per the stipulated parameters.