CleanCredit: Making India as Clean as Switzerland

The trash Problem in India

The Garbage problem is India’s national shame. The solid waste management system is

broken, trash can be found everywhere, and there is little segregation of waste and little

recycling. There is no public culture of keeping the commons clean. No policy has worked so

far; provisions to fine littering exist in law but are not implementable in practice, and public

education campaigns have not made any impact.

The nature of the Problem

Every Indian household keeps its house or property clean but dumps the trash just outside the

house because it is public property. This individual behavior imposes cost on the society; it

pollutes the commons, the land, air and water. The garbage problem in India is a “Tragedy of

the Commons”. This situation arises when there are negative externalities i.e. when the true

cost of consumption is not included in the price of the products and services consumed.

Including the cost of externality remediates the problem. This approach has been widely

adopted in policies to manage the global commons. Carbon Credit mechanism and container

deposit legislations are examples of this approach.

What is CleanCredit?

CleanCredit is a monetary incentive based waste management system. It is based on the fact

that anything worth significant value will not remain on the streets or get dumped. If we could

put some significant monetary value into every manufactured waste (PET, Plastic bags,

Packaging Material etc.), these items will not remain littered. CleanCredit mechanism enables

putting significant residual monetary value (at-least Re 1) into every unit of waste by putting

deposit on every unit of product manufactured.

CleanCredit Mission

To make India as Clean as Switzerland in 1-2 years!

Operational goal

Top 25-30 manufacturers produce more than 80% of manufactured solid waste in India. We

intend to persuade these companies to adopt CleanCredit mechanism and put deposit on their

product packaging.

The ultimate goal is to get a regulation passed which makes it mandatory for every

manufactured product to have deposit.

Possible Impact of CleanCredit

1. Clean India up of all manufactured trash.

2. Create a zero waste society where everything that is recyclable is recycled.

3. Generate 20 million jobs paying $4 per day on the average.

Pilot I

The mechanism was piloted in the IIMB campus during the IIMB Vista festival ( 1st – 3rd Oct).

The pilot was successful in verifying the assumptions of the CleanCredit mechanism.

Setup

Every product being sold in the Campus was tagged with a sticker of CleanCredit with a face-

value of Re 1 and equivalent amount was collected from the shopkeepers. The products were

sold at a price of Re 1 above the MRP. There was a deposit centre with 7 bins for different

categories of waste, packaging material bearing the CleanCredit tag could be redeemed at the

deposit centre if it was deposited in the appropriate bin.

Results Achieved

1. No CleanCredit tagged products found littered in the environment. (Proves the point that

anything worth significant money does not lie unattended for long)

2. Complete segregation of waste into seven categories. (Proves the point that people pay

attention)

3. Enthusiastic participation of housekeeping staff. (No need for elaborate environmental

awareness campaign, if the incentives are right people will work)

Pilot II

The second pilot is being carried out in the campus during Unmaad, the cultural festival of IIMB

( 21st to 23rd Jan). The goal of the pilot is to serve as a live demonstration of the mechanism to

the people attending the festival. It is hoped that it will influence people to implement this

mechanism in their own organizations.

For more details on CleanCredit refer to the links below:

1. www.facebook.com/CleanCredit (like us on facebook )

2. http://vimeo.com/17647210 (Video of TEDx Talk on CleanCredit)

3. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yobp5YCzGG0 ( Animation Ad of CleanCredit)