Plastic not 100% biodegradable, claiming otherwise would be misleading: BIS

Plastic is not a 100 per cent biodegradable product and if any manufacturers claim otherwise it will tantamount to misleading advertisement, a top BIS official said on Wednesday.

Meanwhile, the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) has suggested the Environment Ministry not to certify biodegradability of plastics as it has not been established and research are still going on in India and other countries.

It would be a fit case of "misleading advertisement" if any manufacturers claims that its plastic products are 100 per cent biodegradable, he added.

"It has not been established whether the plastic is actually 100 per cent biodegradable. Research is still going on on this subject in India and across the world," BIS Director General Pramod Kumar Tiwari told reporters.

Although, there are a few test methods and standards but none of them confirm that plastic is biodegradable, he said.

Further, Tiwari said the same was conveyed to the officials of the Environment Ministry in a recent ...