top of page

By:

Dr. Sanjay Joshi

31 August 2024 at 3:05:29 pm

India: The Largest Source of Plastic Pollution Worldwide

So, dear readers, now that we have learnt how and why waste plastic causes pollution, let us look a little deeper into this problem, which has grown out of proportion both globally and locally. Plastic pollution is no longer a distant issue; it has become a serious and immediate threat to our environment. According to the latest data from the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), and several international researchers, over 460...

India: The Largest Source of Plastic Pollution Worldwide

So, dear readers, now that we have learnt how and why waste plastic causes pollution, let us look a little deeper into this problem, which has grown out of proportion both globally and locally. Plastic pollution is no longer a distant issue; it has become a serious and immediate threat to our environment. According to the latest data from the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), and several international researchers, over 460 million metric tonnes of plastic are produced worldwide every year. This plastic is used in a wide range of applications, many of which are short-lived and quickly discarded. From this, an estimated 20–23 million metric tonnes of plastic waste end up in the environment annually. This figure is expected to increase sharply by 2040 if strong measures are not taken. Plastic litter is now found everywhere—on land, in rivers, in oceans, and even in the air as microplastics. Although plastic pollution is a global problem, Mera Mahan Bharat is sadly at the forefront of this crisis. A recent paper published in Nature states that India has become the world’s largest contributor to plastic pollution, accounting for nearly 20% of the total global plastic waste. India generates about 9.3 million tonnes of plastic waste every year. This is more than the waste produced by many regions. Of this, nearly 3.5 million tonnes are improperly discarded and mismanaged, meaning they are neither collected nor scientifically processed. Plastic waste in India has been rising at an alarming rate due to rapid urbanisation, population growth, and economic development. In cities, the demand for single-use plastics and packaging materials has increased drastically, driven by convenience and changing lifestyles. India’s per capita plastic consumption has reached around 11 kg per year and is expected to grow further with increasing industrialisation and consumerism. This trend places enormous pressure on our already overburdened waste management systems. The major factors responsible for the sharp increase in plastic pollution in India are as follows. Single-Use Plastics Single-use plastics, such as polythene carry bags, straws, disposable cutlery, cups, and packaging materials, form a large share of India’s plastic waste. Despite regulatory bans and restrictions, nearly 43% of the country’s total plastic waste still comes from single-use plastics. This clearly shows that the problem lies not only in policy-making but also in enforcement and implementation. The continued dominance of single-use plastics is largely due to weak monitoring and the lack of affordable, easily available alternatives. Many small vendors, shopkeepers, and consumers still find plastic to be the cheapest and most convenient option for daily use. Although the government introduced a ban on selected single-use plastic items in 2022, its impact on the ground has been limited. These products are still widely manufactured, sold, and used because they are inexpensive, lightweight, and readily available in local markets, making the ban difficult to enforce consistently. Open Burning and Landfilling: About 5.8 million tonnes of plastic waste are openly burnt across India every year, mainly in rural areas and urban slums. This practice is extremely dangerous, as it not only worsens air pollution but also releases highly toxic chemicals into the atmosphere. These pollutants directly harm local communities and add to climate change. In addition, nearly 30% of total plastic waste is dumped in uncontrolled landfills. Such sites are not scientifically managed, allowing harmful chemicals to seep into the soil and nearby water bodies. Over time, this contaminates groundwater, damages ecosystems, and poses serious risks to human and animal life. During the winter months, it is common to see people collecting wood and dry leaf litter from the streets, lighting small fires, and sitting around them for warmth. However, plastic bottles, wrappers, and polythene bags often get mixed in and are burnt along with the leaves. Most people are unaware that they are not only polluting the environment but also inhaling toxic fumes from very close distances. The smoke from burning plastic contains harmful substances that can cause respiratory problems, eye irritation, skin issues, and even long-term diseases such as cancer. Open burning of plastic is therefore one of the most hazardous practices for human health and environmental safety. Besides these factors, inefficient waste management infrastructure, discrepancies in data reporting, and heavy dependence on informal waste handling systems further worsen the problem. We will explore these issues in greater detail next week. Till then, have a good weekend! (The author is an environmentalist. Views Personal.)

The Inbox That Never Closes

If work pauses until you reply, your memory is the company’s real operating system.

Every founder I’ve met carries an inbox that never closes.


I don’t mean Gmail. I mean the invisible backlog of approvals, half-decisions, and remembered SOPs they hold in their head.


On the surface, their company looks structured. Tools are in place. Dashboards glow green. Teams hold standups.


And yet … everything still circles back to the founder.


One client, a factory scaling past 200 people, had ERP systems humming. But when I traced execution delays, every decision still depended on the founder’s WhatsApp replies. His mental memory had quietly become the company’s operating system.


Why Systems Still Orbit the Founder

This isn’t failure of tools. It’s cognitive overload disguised as leadership.


Founders underestimate how much unstructured decision weight they carry.


They remember exceptions. They hold “what good looks like” in their heads. They personally track client preferences, vendor quirks, and which manager needs more handholding.


All of that lives in their invisible inbox.


And when the inbox gets too full, the system slows.


The irony? The more structured the company looks, the harder it is to admit that the real bottleneck is invisible: founder headspace.


The Cost of Mental Bottlenecks

At the factory, managers often paused before moving. Not because they didn’t know what to do, but because the founder had trained them to wait:

• “Let me just check with him.”

• “He usually wants to see it first.”

•“Better hold before we ship.”


The outcome was predictable:

• Approvals that should have taken hours stretched into days.

• A team that looked busy, but silently queued behind the founder’s mental decisions.

• A founder who worked late into the night … not to build strategy, but to clear an inbox no one else could see.


This is the hidden tax of cognitive overload. Everyone works harder, but velocity collapses because the operating system is memory, not design.


Why Founders Struggle to Let Go

It’s easy to say: “Just delegate.” But overload isn’t about workload … it’s about cognitive load.


Founders don’t cling because they love control. They cling because they fear:

• Inconsistency

• Rework

• Missed signals


Memory feels safer than structure because it’s instant and personal. Until it breaks.


The problem is that memory doesn’t scale. Teams don’t grow by learning what’s in your head. They grow by seeing how decisions are made without you.


The Shift: From Memory to System


The first step isn’t hiring more people or buying another tool.


It’s naming the problem: your invisible inbox is the system.


From there, small shifts start releasing load:

• Document one rule you keep in memory. Share it.

• Tag ownership on one recurring process, so teams stop asking “Who decides?”

• Run one week where every approval must route through the system, not your WhatsApp.


These aren’t efficiency hacks. They’re cognitive load transfers. Each one moves memory into visibility.


The Human Confession

When I ask founders what they’re most afraid of, the answers are rarely about markets or margins.


It’s the quiet admission: “If I stop replying, I’m scared everything will stop.”


And that’s the heart of the load trap.


Your team has matured, but your mental inbox never shrank. Instead of scaling out of your head, the company scaled deeper into it.


Final Reflection

If work pauses until you reply, you’re not just a founder … you’re the bottleneck.


The real test of scale isn’t whether dashboards look clean. It’s whether decisions move when you’re unavailable.


So before you clear your email inbox tonight, ask the harder question:


How full is the inbox in my head … and what will it take to finally empty it into the system?


Read more in-depth insights at: www.ppsconsulting.biz/blog


(The writer is co-founder at PPS Consulting. He helps growth-stage founders design leadership systems. Write to rahul@ppsconsulting.biz or connect on LinkedIn.)

Comments

bottom of page