The city’s rich history and cultural heritage are intertwined with the iconic monument, but the rise of the footwear industry has led to a significant increase in pollution and waste. The city’s air quality has deteriorated, and the water bodies are being polluted by industrial effluents. Agra’s environmental challenges are not limited to the footwear industry. The city is also grappling with issues like traffic congestion, inadequate waste management, and a lack of green spaces.
Despite the Agra Municipal Corporation (AMC) collecting about 57 per cent of the footwear waste generated from informal entities, the rest — nearly 6 tonnes per day — still end up discarded in drains, open spaces or burnt, creating a significant environmental hazard. Agra’s identity as a major footwear production hub dates back centuries. Today, the city has 6,821 footwear manufacturing units, producing between 900,000 to a million pairs of shoes daily. This massive production scale comes with a price.
