NEW DELHI: The Urban Development Ministry plans to promote the initiative of using City Compost produced from municipal solid waste.

This will be done through a multi-platform communication campaign commencing soon featuring megastar Amitabh Bachchan.

In this context, Urban Development Minister M Venkaiah Naidu who also holds the Information and Broadcasting portfolio spoke to Bachchan to convey his gratitude for agreeing to be the face of the Ministry’s new communication campaign.

Bachchan is expected to appeal to all citizens, nursery owners and horticulture agencies to pledge to use only city compost in their gardens, farm houses and public gardens.

Additionally, he will be making an appeal to bulk waste generators like educational institutions and hotels to set up decentralized composting equipment in their respective premises and encourage the citizens to segregate organic waste for further composting.

India currently produces over 1.54 lakh Metric Tonne of solid waste per day, 50% of which comprises of organic waste that can be converted into compost & gas; 30% is inorganic waste, which can be converted into energy. India has the potential to produce 54 lakh Metric Tonne of compost per annum from waste. Compost, produced organically from waste, are free of harmful chemicals and serve to provide carbon and primary / secondary nutrients to soil and increases its water retention capacity. Composting imitates nature’s way of rebuilding soil by encouraging the decomposition of organic substances. Besides being the cheapest method of disposing organic wastes, composting is eco-friendly, since it prevents production of harmful greenhouse gases (especially methane) and toxic material that pollutes groundwater apart from polluting the environment.