NCC Urged to Ban Plastic-Based Recharge Cards
Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), the telecommunications regulatory body has been urged to dissuade the GSM service providers and Private Telecommunications Operators (PTOs) from using plastic materials to print their pre-paid recharge cards.
The Environmental Right Initiative (ERI), an advocacy group that propagates the usage of biodegradable materials in the country, made this call. According to the President of the group, Akin Akindeko, plastic recharge cards just like other plastic-based packages is not environmental friendly.
Akindeko noted in a press statement that plastic recharge cards is in the bracket of other non-biodegradable materials such as pure water sachet, bottled water plastic, polythene bags that contributes to incessant flooding in the country, especially Lagos metropolis. He said it is enough that the material used for wrapping these cards is plastic and constitutes its own hazard, but something can be done about the cards themselves.
Recent survey reveals that over 500 million prepaid recharge cards are used annually in Nigeria and substantial number of it were made with plastic materials, a non-biodegradable product.
The group also argued that it is beneficial for telephone companies to embrace the paper or board-based form of recharge cards because it is easier and cheaper to produce than the plastic types.
According to Akindeko, �printing of recharge cards with paper or board materials will definitely bring down the production cost of recharge cards because the cost of an average plastic-based card doubles that of a paper or board card�.
Besides, He said the plastic-based recharge cards encourage the counterfeiting and faking of recharge cards. He explained that it is easier for the unscrupulous elements in the society to repackage used plastic-based recharge cards for resale to unsuspected telephone users.
It only requires the re-sealing of the PIN number and wrapping to repackage a used plastic-based card, whereas paper or board-based recharge cards can easily be destroyed immediately after use�, he added.
The group also noted that the global trends in printing of prepaid recharge cards is gradually moving towards paper or board-based cards because of cost and environmental issues.
However, the group commended all the telephone companies that currently uses paper or board-based recharge cards for their environmental friendly gestures and appealed to others that uses plastic recharge cards to embrace the global trend.
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