Reduce waste to save environment and money:

Reduce waste to save environment and money:

Generation of waste in any industry is a result of using materials inefficiently. It costs your business money. The costs of wastes are twofold: first you fail to gain the desired benefits by using more raw materials and second, you also have to pay disposal costs for wastes. Apart, environment gets dirtier causing lot of air, water pollution and other related nuisances.

A. By reducing waste, you can automatically make your processes more efficient and more competitive. The benefits of operating your business more efficiently are clear - including reduced overhead costs, savings in time and money and increased competitiveness. Better economy is achieved as you save additional costs for maintaining pollution free environment.

Although you can sometimes use waste as a resource and save money, it is more efficient to reduce waste at the point of origination. Waste activities such as recycling and recovery use energy so the priority should be to reduce waste in the first place. Businesses that take a strategic approach to minimizing waste are likely to save the most money. Experience in many countries suggests that businesses across a range of industries can save about 10 per cent of turnover by employing waste minimization techniques.

B. Immediate cost-savings can be achieved by:

(i) Reviewing your activities and processes and making simple changes such as printing or photocopying on both sides of the paper;

(ii) Designing packaging so that it can be reused;

(iii) Reusing any waste you produce until it no longer has any value and then recycling the materials.

Customers, employees and potential investors are all becoming more aware of environmental responsibility and failure to take action could affect your business.

C. You face rising energy and waste disposal costs, increased legal obligations and higher stakeholder expectations. In some industries, producers now have ultimate responsibility for the disposal of their products, not just their creation. Adopting a waste strategy means that you will be better prepared for any new legislation for reduction as well as for better disposal of your products (finished goods and wastes).

The penalties for failing to manage environmental risks properly can also be substantial. You could experience damage to your reputation, disruption to your business or financial penalties.

"Resource productivity" means extracting the most value from resources, making the best use of renewable resources and minimizing waste produced. It has the potential to drive down costs by reducing waste and pollution and will create opportunities for growth through process and product innovation.