Extended Producer Responsibility as an Instrument for Electronic Waste Management: A Critical Analysis of India’s e-waste Rules

K. Bhaskar and Rama Mohana Turaga

No WP2015-01-04, IIMA Working Papers from Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad, Research and Publication Department

Abstract: Extended producer responsibility (EPR) has been a widely used policy approach, in developed and developing countries alike, to manage the growing problem of electronic waste (e-waste). EPR assigns the responsibility of the end-of-life waste management to the producers of electric and electronic equipment. India has adopted EPR approach in its e-waste (Management and Handling) Rules, 2011, which have come into effect in May, 2012. According to these rules, the producers have been made responsible for setting up collection centres of e-waste and financing and organizing a system for environmentally sound management of e-waste. In this paper, we use implementation of these rules in the city of Ahmedabad in western India as a case study to conduct a critical analysis of the provisions of India’s new rules. Interviews of main stakeholder groups, including a sample of commercial establishments regulated under the rules, regulatory agencies enforcing the rules, informal actors involved in waste collection and handling, as well as publicly available information on the implementation constitute data for our case study. We draw broader implications of our analysis of implementation in Ahmedabad. In general, there is a need for more transparency from the producers in providing information on the mechanism for collection and recycling; more awareness must be generated on e-waste and the Rules amongst the consumers; and it is important to sort out potential issues around enforcement jurisdiction.

Date: 2015-01-22
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-env
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.iima.ac.in/sites/default/files/rnpfiles/13445794652015-01-04.pdf English Version (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:iim:iimawp:13176

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in IIMA Working Papers from Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad, Research and Publication Department Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by ().