Call to extend time to exhaust single-use plastic stock

NURPUR, JUNE 9

The Himachal Pradesh Beopar Mandal, while welcoming a ban on single use plastic (SUP) being imposed by the Government of India from July 1, has urged the state and Central government to extend the scheduled period of exhausting the stock of SUP items from June 30 to December 31.

Sumesh Sharma, state president of the mandal, in a statement here today said the wholesale as well as retail traders dealing in SUP items had huge stocks of raw material and finished products that could not be exhausted in one month in June.

Sharma said if the government didn’t extend the period of exhausting the stock, the traders would suffer huge financial loss as their SUP stock would be of no use after enforcement of the ban on SUP items. He asserted that a large number of traders were directly or indirectly connected with the trading of SUP items.

“The government should either extend the period for a few months so that traders existing SUP stocks could run out or the government should buy their stocks on their own to save traders from incurring financial losses,” he said.

The Beopar Mandal president said the government should provide some alternative system to replace SUP items in the market and until a new system was introduced, the small vendors, shopkeepers and general public should not be harassed and penalized.

To face losses

Traders will suffer huge financial loss as their stock will be of no use after enforcement of the ban on items