Raja M Shanmugham, President appealed to the Hon’ble Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu not to ban polybags manufactured and supplied to garment manufacturing units and sent a letter sent to the Hon’ble Chief Minister. “We would like to thank the Hon’ble Chief Minister for banning the use of “Use and throwaway plastics” from 1st January 2019 onwards to make Tamil Nadu plastic free to prevent serious environmental hazards and health problems amongst human beings as well as plants and animals and in this connection, the Environment and Forest Department, Government of Tamil Nadu has issued the notification G.O.(MS).No. 84 dated 25.6.2018,” said Shanmugham in the letter.
“We wish to note that in the banned plastics items, across the board all the items including the polybag used for packing of the garments to the exports as well as in the domestic markets has also been included which would cause a big impact on the garment manufacturing units and the point of contention is that the garment industry would totally come into stand still as they don’t have any other alternative for packing of the garments. Moreover, there will also be a cascading effect on downstream activities of garment sector.
“In the garment sector, the polybag is used for packing of each and every garment and these polybags are recycled. More importantly, as there is no environmental issue in the usage of polybag, the environment conscious countries are also insisting to use polybags for packing garments. For the reference, we wish to mention here that one of the importer in abroad has given a polybag specification mentioning that individual garment polybag shrouding should be made from minimum 20 micron (80 gauge) LDPE and Master (Set) or ‘blister’ polybag shrouding should be made from minimum 25 micron (100 gauge) LDPE. (Enclosed),” said Shanmugham.
“We wish to note that the usage of polybag for packing purpose is important for the garment exporting units and as per the buyers specification of polybags, the garments manufactured in Tirupur units are packed in poly bags and are being exported and the concern is that we have to pack the garments as per requirement of buyers and we could not seek other alternatives. As we are purely operating in the buyer’s market, the conditions imposed have to be followed strictly.
“Considering the specific requirements of garment sector, we request the Hon’ble Chief Minister to kindly exempt in manufacturing and supplying of polybags used in the garment units from the plastic ban and help to do exports hassle free and also supplying in the domestic markets,” concluded Shanmugham.
The same requisition letters have also sent to OS Manian, Hon’ble Minister of Textiles, Government of Tamil Nadu and K Phanindra Reddy IAS., Principal Secretary, Department of Handloom and Textiles, Government of Tamil Nadu. Tirupur District Collector and Tirupur Corporation Commissioner were also requested to help in this regard.
