India’s first ‘garbage café’ has opened in Ambikapur, where people can exchange collected rubbish for food. In a real ‘kill two birds with one stone’ type situation, people who present 1kg of plastic waste will receive a full meal, with half of that fetching a breakfast—a solution that feeds the poor and cleans up the streets.
The city’s mayor, Ajay Tirkey, said that the café would run from the city’s main bus bay, and plans have been made to look into providing shelter to homeless people, as well. Collected plastic will be used in construction, a process that remains a prominent solution to build greener roads in India. Ambikapur already has a stretch of road that has been constructed out of a combination of plastic bags and asphalt—a road that ends up lasting longer and is more resistant to flooding.
