Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (SIAM) in association with Japan Automotive Recyclers Alliance (JARA) organised the 11th Asian Automotive Environmental Forum (AAEF) in India to discuss the pathway for setting up scrappage infrastructure for handling End-Of-Life (old) vehicles in India. The AAEF was organised in India for the first time in New Delhi and was titled 'Automotive Recycling In India: Pathway To The Future- Towards Sustainable Society.' The conference has seen over 150 delegates from Japan, USA, China, India among countries.
The key focus of the participants who attended the conference was to reduce dependency on single technology and focus on varied forms of automotive recycling which are used globally to take on growing need for recycling vehicles that are more than 15 years old and are plying in India. The speakers also urged the government to lay out a policy roadmap to ensure that issues related to vehicle recycling in India are addressed. Stressing on evolving environmental feasibility, social acceptability and economic viability aspects, N S Mohan Ram, Advisor, TVS Motors & Chairman, SIAM Recycling Group said, "We are the fastest growing economy in the world and have a huge consumer base and demand for mobility, both for personal and public use. However, due to lack of ELV recycling procedures and infrastructure, makes it a big mismatch, as we are one of the world biggest manufacturers of vehicles."
Sujeet Samaddar, Senior Consultant, Niti Aayog talked about the ground situation on recycling vehicles which is not good in India and needs immediate redressal. He advocated that the focus on automotive recycling industry needs to grow at the same speed as the Indian Automobile Industry. "Automobile Recycling will not only ensure a strong economic growth, but also create a large social impact and offer immense opportunity for rationally putting in effective interventions for recycling End-of-Life (old) Vehicle in India," said Samaddar.
Rashmi Urdhwareshe, Director, ARAI spoke about Indian Government's vehicle scrappage policy, which is expected soon and will have fleet modernization schemes and aim at encouraging voluntary scraping of old vehicles. "The government initiatives and the upcoming policy on scrapping of vehicles will enhance the scope of ELV regulations, fleet modernization, vehicles nearing their end life, dismantling centres are located and controlled in structured manner,"
India is still on the verge of formulating a scrappage policy which initially will be limited to 20 years old commercial vehicles only. These will get an incentive of 15 per cent of their purchase cost. The proposal was presented to the GST council in May 2018 and is due for approval. The proposed policy aims at taking 20 years and older multi axle vehicles off the road in a bid to tackle pollution. The policy is likely to be implemented simultaneously with the BSVI norms in April 2020.
