For the sake of the environment

It is good to see the High Court give an order to stop production of laminated posters for both Dhaka north and south city corporations.

As this newspaper has editorialized before, the overuse of plastic is a serious environmental problem for our capital city. But while certain useful plastic products may have some justification for existing, that excuse does not apply to laminated posters.

The waste management system in our city is particularly problematic, and needs a massive overhaul to say the least. Plastic pollution has a tendency to clog up our drainage system, worsening the urban water-logging that we experience every year.

Water-logging, in turn, aids in the hatching of harmful breeds of mosquitoes, which thrive in dirty, stagnant pools of water. Diseases such as dengue, as a result, are seen in Bangladesh every year like clockwork.

Thousands upon thousands metric tons of plastic waste are littered into the Bay of Bengal ever year, according to a recent study that was conducted by the Bangladesh Fish Research Institute and Bangladesh Agricultural University. We should be doing all we can to reduce this waste, not adding to it.

At the end of the day, what citizens want is a cleaner, more sustainable Dhaka.

Our mayoral candidates, regardless of political affiliations, should pay heed to the wishes of the public, which means working towards a more environmentally sound capital city, not just after being elected to office, but during the electioneering process as well.