City Corporation Mayor V.K.Prashanth on Wednesday chaired the first meeting of the green protocol committee as part of the Onam week celebrations. Green protocol will be strictly observed across all the 30 venues in which the Onam week celebrations will be held from September 3 to 9.
Plastic carry bags and disposable items will be completely banned in these venues. Sales of food items in disposable plates will be banned in festival venues. At the entrance of the venues, plastic items will be fixed with a sticker at a nominal charge, which will be refunded on returning with the same plastic items.
Flex materials will not be allowed on arches and hoardings. Cloth or bio-degradable items have to be used. Volunteers will be appointed in two shifts for cleaning the venues. The collected plastic will be handed over to the Clean Kerala company. Special stalls will be allotted at the venues for paper carry bags and other plastic alternatives at the festival venues.
Green volunteers, selected from among interested applicants from the NSS and NCC will be deployed across the 30 venues. Interested volunteers can send their entries to greenonam@gmail.com. Awards will be given to the best performing green volunteers and to shops which follow the green protocol strictly.
A request will be sent to the festival committee to consider for its awards the floats which use the least amount of plastic.