The Tiny Plastic Packages That Are Fuelling Asia's Waste Crisis. P4-5
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Community Community Karnataka Students Sangha Qatar, in Qatar P7a socio- P16 University’s cultural organisation, Al-Bairaq programme completes two present 29 scientific decades of projects at Research and excellence. Innovation Conference. Thursday, November 14, 2019 Rabia I 17, 1441 AH Doha today: 220 - 290 COVER STORY Hazardous The tiny plastic packages that are fuelling Asia’s waste crisis. P4-5 REVIEW SHOWBIZ Stewart gives comedic performance I want to be a pop star like in woke Charlie’s Angels. Beyonce: Shalmali Kholgade. Page 14 Page 15 2 GULF TIMES Thursday, November 14, 2019 COMMUNITY ROUND & ABOUT PRAYER TIME Fajr 4.30am Shorooq (sunrise) 5.51am Zuhr (noon) 11.20am Asr (afternoon) 2.26pm Maghreb (sunset) 4.48pm Isha (night) 6.18pm USEFUL NUMBERS Terminator: Dark Fate in time is Grace, a hybrid cyborg human who must protect DIRECTION: Tim Miller Ramos from the seemingly indestructible robotic assassin. CAST: Linda Hamilton, Arnold Schwarzenegger, But the two women soon fi nd some much-needed help from Mackenzie Davis a pair of unexpected allies – seasoned warrior Sarah Connor SYNOPSIS: In Mexico City, a newly modifi ed liquid and the T-800 Terminator. Terminator – the Rev-9 model – arrives from the future to kill a young factory worker named Dani Ramos. Also sent back THEATRES: The Mall, Royal Plaza Emergency 999 Worldwide Emergency Number 112 Kahramaa – Electricity and Water 991 Local Directory 180 International Calls Enquires 150 Hamad International Airport 40106666 Labor Department 44508111, 44406537 Mowasalat Taxi 44588888 Qatar Airways 44496000 Hamad Medical Corporation 44392222, 44393333 Qatar General Electricity and Water Corporation 44845555, 44845464 Primary Health Care Corporation 44593333 44593363 Qatar Assistive Technology Centre 44594050 Qatar News Agency 44450205 44450333 Q-Post – General Postal Corporation 44464444 Humanitarian Services Offi ce (Single window facility for the repatriation of bodies) Ministry of Interior 40253371, 40253372, 40253369 Ministry of Health 40253370, 40253364 Hamad Medical Corporation 40253368, 40253365 Qatar Airways 40253374 Kaithi convicted criminal who wants to meet his daughter for fi rst DIRECTION: Lokesh Kanagaraj time in life cross each other’s path? Find out! CAST: Karthi, Narain, George Maryan SYNOPSIS: What happens when an injured cop and a THEATRES: Royal Plaza, Landmark, The Mall te Unqu uo ot Q “Change e your thoughts and you change your world.” — Norman Vincent Peale Community Editor For movie timings and Kamran Rehmat further details please scan e-mail: [email protected] the QR code above with your Telephone: 44466405 mobile phone camera or visit qatarcinemas.com Fax: 44350474 Thursday, November 14, 2019 GULF TIMES 3 ROUND & ABOUT COMMUNITY TIME: 4pm — 9pm centre for learning. We off er regular classes A one stop place for school leavers. All in the following disciplines like traditional prospective students who are planning classical and folk dance forms, art and to study in Malaysia are welcome to the craft, drawing and painting, personality exhibition. Come and be a part of the truly development and public speaking, Bollywood Asian culture in Doha. dance, contemporary, hip hop styles, music both vocals and instrumentals. To develop health consciousness, we train them karate, Artistic Gymnastic Classes yoga with special sessions for kids and adults. WHERE: Qatar Academy Msheireb Mamangam has also come up with chess and WHEN: Ongoing robotics in regular batches in an attempt to TIME: 3:15pm – 4:15pm give a better learning experience, as they The olympic sport using horizontal bar, sharpen their minds and brains too. rings and fl oor exercises on mats for the For those who wish to register for more children from age 4 till 16. details, visit www.mamangamqatar.in Gems and Jewels Exhibition hierarchies and health systems of the local WHERE: Museum of Islamic Art Tanzanian communities. WHEN: Ongoing till January 18 A collection of photographs of the wildlife, TIME: 9am onwards landscapes and people of Tanzania taken by Ballet Lessons The exhibition comes in celebration of WCM-Q professor Dr Dietrich Büsselberg WHERE: Music and Arts Atelier the 2019 Year of Culture Qatar-India and will be exhibited. WHEN: Ongoing presents a look at magnifi cent gems and TIME: 4pm – 8pm jewellery from India. Set in Stone: Gems and For more info e-mail at registration@ Jewels from Royal Indian Courts showcases atelierqatar.com or call on 33003839. more than 100 pieces from across Qatar Museums’ (QM) collections, including many masterpieces that have never been displayed After School Activities before. WHERE: Atelier WHEN: Ongoing Music and arts activities for students taking place after they fi nish their day in school includes Group Music lessons, Hip- hop, Ballet, Drawing and Painting, Drama Theatre & Taekwondo. Ages between 5 and 10 years old after school hours. Career Guidance Photo Exhibition: ‘Experience WHERE: Right Track Consultants, Al Tanzania’ Sadd WHERE: Multaqa (Student Center) Art WHEN: Sunday – Thursday Gallery at Education City TIME: 6pm – 8pm WHEN: Ongoing until December 1 Career guidance for course, country, TIME: 4pm college and entrance for students of Grade ‘Experience Tanzania’ is a yearly project IX-XII, of all curriculum. Career assessments Hobby Classes supported by Student Aff airs Division of administered for stream preference, career WHERE: Mamangam Performing Art Weill Cornell Medicine-Qatar that allows test, branch preference, personality, Centre students and faculty to explore and immerse multiple intelligence and learning styles WHEN: Saturday – Friday themselves in Tanzanian urban and rural and productivity. For more information, Mamangam is an art and performance cultures. During their trip, WCM-Q’s 55448835. centre started with a vision of spreading aspiring physicians off er basic healthcare our knowledge, interests and experience in services to the locals as a way of giving Education Fair various disciplines in arts across diff erent back to the community and learn about WHERE: City Centre Doha countries for children and adults. the lifestyles, traditions, socioeconomic WHEN: November 22 — 23 Mamangam has become the favourite Compiled by Nausheen Shaikh. E-mail: [email protected], Events and timings subject to change 4 GULF TIMES Thursday, November 14, 2019 COMMUNITY COVER STORY Sachets of concern The packaging cannot be easily recycled, and in cities like Manila with spotty waste collection, the used pouches have piled up in empty fields, collected in sewers and spilled into rivers and oceans, writes Shashank Bengali wo dozen children fanned out along a creek near their elementary school, fi lling sacks with litter left by residents Tof the concrete shacks lining the waterway. When they’d fi nished the morning cleanup, the students emptied a large garbage bag to study its contents. A stream of shiny plastic scraps spilled onto the school’s driveway. Bearing the names of familiar international brands of coff ee creamer, biscuits, laundry detergent and candy, the discarded packaging illustrated one of the biggest environmental challenges facing Asia’s booming cities. The palm-sized packets known as sachets have exploded in emerging economies, allowing low-income consumers to buy single servings of almost any product. But the packaging cannot be easily recycled, and in cities like Manila with spotty waste collection, the used pouches have piled up in empty fi elds, collected in sewers and spilled into rivers and oceans — adding to a glut of plastic waste that Asian countries have begun to regard as an environmental crisis. “For people who live on a day- to-day basis, sachets are a reality of life — but they are also one of the biggest waste problems we face,” said George Oliver De La Rama, a spokesman for the Pasig River Rehabilitation Commission, the government agency overseeing the cleanup this month. As environmental groups sound the alarm over harmful plastic debris, Western consumer goods companies are searching for ways to reduce the use of sachets and make them easier to recycle. In Manila, SPOTLIGHT: Plastic sachets of single use consumer goods hang from a storefront in Navotas, a suburb of Manila in the Philippines. manufacturers are investing in plans to turn used plastic into bricks, tiles and classroom chairs. Meanwhile, the number of sachets in the environment For people who live on a continues to explode. The Philippines, an archipelago day-to-day basis, sachets are with more than 105 million people spread across 7,600 islands, a reality of life — but they are consumes about 59.7 billion also one of the biggest waste sachets every year, according to the Global Alliance for Incinerator problems we face Alternatives, or GAIA, an advocacy group. That’s enough to cover all of metropolitan Manila — or roughly half of Los Angeles — in one foot of — George Oliver De La Rama, plastic. spokesman for Pasig River For consumer goods giants, sachets were “a brilliant Rehabilitation Commission marketing tactic to capture the ‘ ’ low-income market and good Thursday, November 14, 2019 GULF TIMES 5 COVER STORY COMMUNITY Unilever products. The Philippines, “Sachets are one of the most an archipelago effi cient ways to deliver these products, but when our packaging with more ends up in the environment, that’s not OK with us,” said Ed Sunico, than 105 vice president for sustainable business at Unilever Philippines. million people But a pilot shampoo refi ll project last year showed little success, spread across environmental groups said, because Unilever placed the dispensers at 7,600 islands, upscale Manila shopping malls — not ideal to reach customers who consumes about buy 10-cent sachets. 59.7 billion “Until they show these can be rolled out at sari-sari stores” — the sachets every ubiquitous neighbourhood stalls where most Filipinos do their daily year, according shopping — “this all just looks like a show,” Hernandez said. to the Global Activists say the Philippine government has failed to enforce Alliance for its waste management law, which requires local governments Incinerator to collect trash from every neighbourhood and prohibits Alternatives, manufacturers from using “non- or GAIA, an environmentally acceptable” packaging material.