Bharat Bhaskar
Garbage Cafe in Ambikapur, India: The more garbage, the better the taste
In Ambikapur, India, customers pay their meals with unusual currency: plastic. In the city’s first “Garbage Cafe”, residents change shopping bags to water bottles for a steaming rice dish or a traditional curry. Smaller quantities of plastic entitle to breakfast.
“The more garbage the better the taste.” A new approach to combating hunger and plastic pollution has been gaining prominence in a small town in downtown India.
No Garbage Cafein Ambikapur the residents pay for their meals not with money, but with plastic wasteexchanging objects such as bags, packaging and bottles for a hot rice dish, vegetable curry, dal, roti, salad or pickles.
For smaller contributions, breakfast foods such as Samosas or Vada Pav are offered.
Launched in 2019 by an Ambikapur municipal company, coffee is part of a broader strategy to face two urgent local problems: Food insecurity and plastic pollution.
The initiative encourages low-income inhabitants, including homeless and collectors of recyclable materials, Collecting discarded plastic from the streets and landfill in exchange for meals.
Vinod Kumar Patelcoffee manager, explains: “The idea was simple: helping people while we cleaned the city”.
For residents like Rashmi mondalthe project has been transformative. So far, it has only won 10 rupees (about 10 cents) per kg of plastic sold to scrap traders; Now exchange the plastic that collects for meals that support your family.
“Makes all the difference in our lives”Says Mondal. On average, coffee serves more than 20 people daily, providing essential nutrition and contributing to the cleansing of the city.
The initiative also helped reduce the plastic sent to landfills. Since its inception, coffee has collected Almost 23 tons of plasticcontributing to the reduction of annual plastic in landfills, from 5.4 tons in 2019 to two tons in 2024.
Although it represents a Small fraction of the 226 tons of plastic Produced in Ambikapur, the effort focuses on waste that would otherwise escape the main collection network.
Ambikapur’s approach to waste management Go beyond coffee. The city operates 20 decentralized collection centers, which employ almost 500 women — as “swachhata Didis”, Or cleaning sisters – that separate waste into more than 60 categories to maximize recycling.
The collected plastic is transformed into Road Construction Granules or sold to recyclers, while organic waste is composed and non -recyclable materials sent to cement factories. These efforts were worth Ambikapur to Reputation of “Zero Aperros” city.
The model of the café café inspirmed similar initiatives throughout India. In West Bengal, Telangana, Karnataka and Uttar Pradesh, residents can exchange plastic for meals, rice or even hygiene products.
Abroad, the Cambodia tested similar projects In floating communities along Lake Tonle Sap.
However, challenges persist. Initiatives in larger cities, such as Deli, faced difficulties due to low public awareness, poor waste separation and limited recycling infrastructure.
Experts point out that although these projects increase consciousness and meet immediate needs, do not solve deeper problemslike the overproduction of plastic or failures in domestic separation.
Still, academics and local authorities consider programs as valuable starting points.
“It’s a good start, but We need greater changes as well”, Says the teacher Minal pathakresearcher in urban climate at AHMEDABAD University.
But for Ambikapur, the Café Garbage represents an innovative approachguided by the community, which transforms waste into food – serving as Example for cities of medium dimension that face similar environmental and social challenges.
