Mangaluru(PTI) The Mangaluru International Airport (MIA) has attained the prestigious Platinum rating in the Airports Council International (ACI)’s Green Airports Recognition (GAR) programme 2023 in the under 8 million passengers per year category.

Bestowed by ACI-Asia-Pacific, the rating is a testament to MIA’s unwavering dedication and accomplishments in green sustainability initiatives, a release from the MIA here said.

The rating is a recognition towards MIAs continued mission to becoming one of the first airports to eliminate the use of single-use plastic (SUP). The award was presented at the 18th ACI Asia-Pacific regional assembly, conference and exhibition in Kobe, Japan.

Centred around the theme of ‘SUP elimination,’ the GAR programme 2023 amplifies the global imperative to combat the detrimental impact of single-use plastic pollution, with a special focus on the aviation industry.

The MIA, as part of the project “SUP free airport” identified sources of single-use plastic that was in in use at the airport, including from business partners, employees, stakeholders, and passengers. Accordingly, the airport issued guidelines to all restaurants to provide wooden cutlery items. In food-beverage outlets, SUP cups, straws have been eliminated and replaced with glass and paper cups and paper straws.

Duty-free bags at international departures and arrivals have been converted to cloth bags. Changeover from SUP bags to paper bags have been implemented at all retail outlets. At the office, use of SUP drinking water bottles has been eliminated and converted to glass bottles.

Under the SUP-free airport campaign, awareness video has been displayed at digital display boards and flight information display system at various locations.

Guidelines have been provided to all vendors to dispatch spare parts, products, and consumables without SUP wrappers. By implementing the above project, MIA has reduced the plastic waste from an average of 1,238 kg per month in FY 22 to an average of 444 kg per a month in FY 23, resulting in reduction of 23.8-tonnes of CO2.

The SUP-free airport project has further bolstered the airport’s intent to achieve Net Zero goals, the release said.