Tax industries and packaging companies for waste management: Dr. Kirit Parikh

Eminent economist Dr. Kirit Parikh has strongly advocated for imposing a tax on manufacturing industries, distributing and packaging companies for the management of the waste they are generating. He also cautioned on alarmingly increasing quantity of waste due to urbanization and highlighted the need for management of all kinds of hazardous waste including plastic waste, electronic waste, agriculture waste, waste-water, etc.

"If a firm produces something and some material goes out, the challenge is to make it realize that this waste disposal costs money. So, you impose a tax on them to incentivize waste management and minimize waste generation," said Dr. Parikh to Devdiscourse in an Exclusive Interview on the sidelines of the Waste Management Series of Summits (WMSS) 2020 organized in New Delhi on 30^th to 31^st January. He also emphasized the need to impose a tax on packaging companies such as Amazon that are generating a huge amount of packaging waste which is directly going into landfill sites. Dr. Parikh was speaking to Devdiscourse after delivering the keynote address for WMSS 2020. Click here, to see the full interview:

Devdiscourse participated in the summit as a media partner. The summit was aimed at providing a platform for integrated and holistic management of all kinds of waste and generating wealth out of it and was attended by experts from various disciplinary and professional backgrounds. The problem of waste management has been included under SDG 12 (Sustainable Development Golas) or Responsible Consumption and Production of the 17 Global Goals (SDGs) of the United Nations for the year 2030 (SDG 2030).

Dr. Parikh is presently Chairman of Integrated Research and Action for Development (IRADe), New Delhi. He has been a Member of the Planning Commission of India rechristened as NITI Aayog and worked as a member of the Economic Advisory Council (EAC) with several prime ministers of India such as Atal Bihari Vajpayee, P. V. Narasimha Rao, Chandra Shekhar, V. P. Singh, and Rajiv Gandhi. "The government needs to increase demands both in domestic as well as in the international market. There is a great need to facilitate export by removing slashing taxation and making them competitive with the international market. The government should not hesitate to reduce the taxes where it could not have done," he added. Dr. Parikh highlighted that due to the burden of multiple GST filing, small investors are being forced to give up the entrepreneurship. Dr. Parikh holds a Doctor of Science in Civil Engineering and a master's degree in Economics from MIT, USA. He is Former (Founder) Director (Vice-Chancellor), Indira Gandhi Institute of Development Research (IGIDR), Mumbai.

For more news and views on waste management, please visit Live Discourse on Waste Management Series of Summits (WMSS 2020) being organized by Indus Exposium on 30th - 31st January 2020 in New Delhi.