State Pollution Control Board-Sikkim organized a day long programme on plastic waste management. The programme was conducted in two sessions on 17th June 2025 at Barbet Hall, Block D, Forest Secretariat Complex, Deorali.
The programme was chaired by Shri. N.W. Tamang, Member Secretary in presence of senior officials of the SPCB-Sikkim, Smt. Kusum Gurung, Additional Director, Shri. Ranjan Rai, Executive Environmental Engineer, SPCB and scientific and technical staff of the Board.
The first session included presentation by representative of two companies namely M/s Aeonix Research and Innovation LLP based at Kolkata, WB and M/s Biocrux India Pvt. Ltd., Maharastra who show-cased their IoT devices namely IoT cloth carry bag vending machine for promoting SUP alternatives and IoT based PET bottle reversing vending machine (RVMs), respectively.
The RVMs enables collection of PET bottles duly incentivizing the public for this task by generating points for each bottle disposed through this machine.
The session was attended by Additional Secretary-cum-Mission Director, SBM-Urban along with senior officials and staff from Urban Development Department, Additional Secretary, Joint Secretary-sum state coordinator along with senior officials and staff from Rural Development Department, District Planning officer from Pakyong, Soreng District, representative from the office of ADC, Gangtok, Joint Director, DHH, officials from Zilla panchayat Offices, Gangtok, Mangan, Namchi, Gyalshing Districts.
The Second session was regarding training programme on Assessment and Characterization of Plastic Waste as per the methodology (Standard Operating Procedure, SOP) developed by Central Pollution Control Board, Govt. of India.
The training-cum-workshop was meant for officials and staff of Rural Development Department, District Planning officer and officials of District Panchayats to enable them to carry out the assessment and characterization of plastic waste within their jurisdiction. This task is mainly required to be undertaken by the District Panchayats and ULBs to quantify the plastic waste generation, collection, segregation and disposal and the details is to be reported by the authorities in the online portal developed for this purpose by the Ministry of Environment and Forest, Govt. of India starting from this financial year.
The rules mandate that local bodies have to submit annual report to the respective Departments and the SPCB before 30th June of every year in the prescribed form, however, starting this year such reporting has to be done in the online portal and the date generated from the assessment and characterization work is to be provided in the report.
The training programme focused on the legal and technical aspect governing the plastic waste management and specifically centered on the procedure for sampling and quantification of plastic waste being generated, recycled and disposed from Municipal and Rural areas as per the standard methodology developed by the CPCB. The local bodies require to submit the data generated through such assessment and characterization work to the State and Central Authorities in an online reporting portal every year under the provision of the Plastic Waste Management Rules (Amendment), 2024.
Further, various information on various online modules/portals developed by CPCB for management of Plastic waste management including SUP inspection App, & public grievance App for lodging of complaints against sale, stocking, use of banned SUP items in any area were also provided to the participants. In addition, online reporting mechanism for plastic waste were discussed in detail.The resource persons for the training programme were Mr. Ranjan Rai, Executive Environmental Engineer, Mr. Pravash Chettri, Junior Engineer, Ms. Sujata Rai, PA, Ms Padma Tamang, LA from SPCB-Sikkim. The programme ended with a vote of thanks by Smt. Kusum Gurung, AD, SPCB.
Press Release from State Pollution Control Board-Sikkim
