Australia
has slashed its plastic bag habit by up to 80 percent within just three
months, according to Australia's
National Retail Association, which is some great news for platypuses,
dugongs, and pig-nosed turtles. Remarkably, this drop in plastic bag
consumption did not come directly from any government policy, it was
effectively a business decision. This sharp turn around is largely thanks to
two of the largest supermarket chains, Coles and Woolworths, deciding to
implement a nationwide ban on free lightweight plastic grocery bags in July,
replacing them with reusable bags sold for 15 cents.
In
total, it has potentially prevented as many as 1.5 billion bags from entering
the environment.
“Retailers
deserve an enormous amount of kudos for leading the way on one of the most
significant changes to consumer behavior in generations and we also applaud
shoppers for embracing this environmental initiative,” David Stout, Manager of
Industry Policy at the National Retail Association, said in a statement.
“Nation-wide
retailers have led the way and as a result also assisted smaller businesses in
providing a template on how to manage the transition to a plastic bag-free
retail environment. As a result, we are seeing similar changes made across the
food, homeware, and service categories.”
The
phase-out of lightweight plastic bags down under is being pursued by
authorities on a regional level, as opposed to national. Plastic bag bans are
in place or pending in most states and territories in Australia, except the
eastern state of New South Wales – Australia's most populated state.
However,
the decision by the big Aussie chains didn’t come easily. Coles appeared
slightly reluctant to impose the ban, flip-flopping
back and forth on their plans several times after shoppers
objected to the change.
“The
decision by certain retailers to no longer offer free single-use plastic carry
bags certainly received a hostile response from some shoppers initially, but
these retailers deserve credit for dramatically reducing the number of bags in
circulation,” added Stout.
While
many regions and nations across the world have started to implement plastic bag
bans, there’s still
a long way to go when we talk about plastic pollution in general.