Masters in lobbying, petrochemicals firms and plastic producers focus attention on waste management and recycling so they can evade their responsibility for the true problem: the growth in the volume of plastics being made.

Plastics are sometimes seen as environmentally friendlier than other materials - not least because of their light weight. But the plastics boom is pumping huge amounts of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.

The first plastics imitated ivory and silk and attracted just a limited market. Things took off after World War II with the rise of PVC. Cheap plastics soon conquered the world.

Studies on Bt cotton swing between the efficacy of Bt cotton and its failure in providing rights and choices to the farmers. Based on a review of discursive analysis and selected field visits to cotton farmers in rural Maharashtra and Rajasthan, this study on Women and Genetically Modified Crops: Bt Cotton in India, attempts at understanding women’s experiences and voices in the cultivation of Bt cotton. Discussing the coloniality of power and knowledge in the given patriarchal system in India and in countries of the Global South, the authors argue for the recognition of work, knowledge and rights of women farmers and how these can be developed in a gender-responsive and sustainable manner.

By focusing environmental and public-health debates on the issue of waste-management, plastics producers have managed to conceal the elephant in the room.