Quantitative assessment of plastic waste in rubber plantations through modelling approach

• Rubber tree rain guarding materials contribute plastic waste • Tree geometry based modelling approach was applied for waste quantification. • Estimated Agricultural Plastic Waste is 33.52±5.51 kg ha⁻¹year⁻¹ Natural rubber (NR) is an essential raw material for manufacturing variety of industrial, household and medical products and it is extracted from the tree Hevea brasiliensis which is a native tree of Amazon forest, now widely cultivated in Southeast Asian countries. Plastic items such as Low-Density Polyethylene (LDPE) film/stripes and High-Density Polyethylene (HDPE) cups are being used for rain guarding in rubber plantation mainly to prevent the latex loss during rainy seasons. Plastic waste generated from rain guarding applications is recognized as a significant environmental issue, while the studies on quantitative assessment of plastic waste from rubber plantations are absent from the existing literature. The main objective of this study is to quantify the plastic usage and the plastic waste, generally referred as Agricultural Plastic Waste (APW), generation from rubber plantations using a tree geometry based model and polymer physical properties. Using girth as the input, the model computes the length and corresponding mass of LDPE strips; LDPE film (used for rain guarding) and HDPE latex collection cups. The model was applied to the rubber plantations of Arasu Rubber Corporation Limited (ARC), India to evaluate tree level and plantation scale plastic usage and waste generation. Results indicate that each rubber tree requires an average of 2.07±0.50 g of LDPE strips, 43.66±10.53 g of LDPE film and 42.60±7.54 g of HDPE latex collection cup with a total plastic load of 88.33±11.03 g/tree/year. The estimated APW arising from the rubber plantation (ARC) is 33.52±5.51 kg ha⁻¹year⁻¹. Replacing plastic materials in rain guarding remains challenging; however, effective waste management is essential to mitigate the resulting environmental impacts.