Chennai: Tender coconut provides a relief from the summer heat. But the empty shells that breed mosquitoes including dengue causing Aedes Aegypti pose a threat to the public health. Greater Chennai Corporation seems to have worked out an eco-friendly plan that involves reusing the empty shells.
As part of the trial run, Chennai Corporation has set up coconut shell scraping machines at two zones -- Madhavaram and Adyar. Empty coconut shells
collected from the streets would be shred into pieces and reused accordingly.
Chennai Corporation Commissioner G. Prakash who conceived the idea said that the motive is to reduce the load on the landfills and take steps towards public health. It may be noted that the commissioner has taken the green route by introducing segregation of waste in the parks.
The machine scrapes the coconut into three categories: coir to be used for making ropes and mats, the dust from the coir is converted to peat and the shells are used for the firewood.
“We were instructed to collect the coconut shells separately for this purpose. It has been happening since a week,” said Armugam K, a conservancy worker at Adyar.
