Parle Agro to invest Rs 50 cr for plastic waste management

Parle Agro, the manufacturer of beverage brands like Frooti and Appy, and also packaged drinking water Bailey, on Monday announced an investment of Rs 50 crore for plastic waste management. The Rs 5,000-crore revenue company, which has been in existence for over three decades is aiming to achieve 100 per cent recycling of the PET bottles by October.

The announcements from the city-based company come amid a heightened government focus lately on the perils of plastic usage and at the cusp of the launch of a nationwide campaign which will make certain practices mandatory. Its managing director Nadia Chauhan said the aim to have 100 per cent PET bottle requires an acceleration in ongoing environment and sustainability initiatives and doubling of investments.

"We are committed to invest Rs 50 crore in the next three years towards this endeavor," she said. The company has tied up with Indian Pollution Control Association (IPCA) to collect and recycle 100 per cent of its PET bottle waste. IPCA has increased its capacity of recycling to 7,000 MT of bottles per annum.

Chauhan said the availability of discarded PET bottles is much less that the capacity for recycling and hence, it is important to ensure plastic is making its way to recycling centres. Without giving a timeline, a company statement said over 1,50,000 million tonnes (MT) of post-consumer PET flakes were imported from across the world by India..