5 Cent Tax Successfully Reduced Plastic Bag Use in England By As Much As 95% Over 5 Years–Great...

[Michie]

...Alternative Emerges

Single-use plastic bag sales in England have fallen dramatically since a 5 pence charge on each bag was instituted in October of 2015 in supermarkets and department stores.

Overall, plastic shopping bag use has fallen by 95% in England’s main supermarkets.

Statistics from the Department of Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) determined that plastic bag use shot up in 2014, as consumers used an average of 140 per year, accounting for 61,000 thousand metric tons of plastic. After taking action to curb the rise by charging 5 cents, widespread use has plummeted—just 4 bags per consumer in the recent fiscal year.

Marks and Spencer, Tesco, Asda, Morrisons, Sainsbury’s, the Co-operative Group, and Waitrose, who together distributed 40% of all plastic bags in the country, have collectively sold 325 million fewer bags than over a period of 2018-19, and remarkably, 1.17 billion fewer than the same period of 2016-17.

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5 Cent Tax Successfully Reduced Plastic Bag Use in England By As Much As 95% Over 5 Years–Great Alternative Emerges

 

[FreeinChrist]

ADVISOR HAT

This thread was moved to a better forum.​

 

[Sketcher]

. . . and then COVID hit.

 

[CRAZY_CAT_WOMAN]

Sadly, most Americans are willing to spend 10 to 15 cents on multiple bags. But good England for having brains cells.

 

[CRAZY_CAT_WOMAN]

. . . and then COVID hit.

I still don't buy plastic bags.

 

[Jimmy D]

Sadly, most Americans are willing to spend 10 to 15 cents on multiple bags. But good England for having brains cells.

Don’t you guys use those brown paper bags mostly? That’s the impression I get from movies and tv. Always seemed sensible, if a little impractical.

I felt a bit embarrassed buying a 5p bag last week when I forgot my reusable one. The success of this scheme is not so much that people don’t want to spend 5p, it’s the fact that it makes you think about the consequences of such a wasteful activity.

 

[Desk trauma]

Don’t you guys use those brown paper bags mostly?

Not for a decade of two now.