The Australian Retailers Association (ARA) believes the plastic bag debate needs to be placed into context of litter management and consumer education as opposed to the emotional rhetoric, populist politics and flawed science currently polluting the debate.
Furthermore, the ARA does not support a tax or a banning on plastic bags as it will lead to greater red tape and compliance costs for retailers – ultimately increasing grocery prices for working families.
ARA Executive Director Richard Evans says proposed plastic bag levies and bans are inapt solutions to a complex issue that requires more consideration and industry participation.
“This issue has never been about the free availability of plastic bags, nor is it about plastic bag usage. It’s about litter management. We should be encouraging consumers to take greater responsibility of how they reuse and dispose of plastic bags. It's a litter issue and simply banning or taxing bags is a poor approach to public policy,” Evans said.
The ARA is currently working with the Federal Government to identify additional measures for retailers to reduce the use of ‘single-use’ plastic bags and is due to report back to the Environment Protection and Heritage Council (EPHC) in November 2008.
FACT or FICTION
The ARA believes the plastic bag debate is driven by inaccurate information being spread in the media about the environmental impacts of plastic bags.
According to reports in The Australian (10 March 2008, Scientists trash plastic bag ban), scientists and environmentalists have questioned the case against the use of plastic shopping bags saying it is based on flawed science and misreporting.
In addition, The Times newspaper in Britain (8 March 2008) has mentioned a report commissioned by the Australian Government that mistakenly blamed plastic bags for animal deaths after misquoting a Canadian study about discarded fishing nets.
The same article quoted scientists, including an expert who advises environmental group Greenpeace, as saying plastic bags pose only a minimal threat to most marine species, including seals, whales, dolphins and seabirds.
Disposal, Reuse & Recycling
Of the 6 billion HDPE bags and 0.9 billion LDPE bags distributed annually in Australia, the actual number of bags currently in the environment and the number littered annually are not known.
Litter collection data from Clean Up Australia (2002) indicates that plastic bags make up approximately two percent of the litter stream. Keep Australia Beautiful (Victoria) data (1999) indicates that all plastic items make up an average of 26.7% of the litter stream by item, which includes items at landfill sites where plastic items consist of 47%. It is further estimated by Keep Australia Beautiful that ‘bags, sacks and sheeting’ makes up an average of 6.2% of the litter stream by item in Victoria; however the shopping bag breakdown of this is not known.
Due to their inherent usefulness in carrying and containing objects, many plastic shopping bags are used beyond their ‘single use’ life. Reuse applications include:
- Waste bags or bin liners;
- Lunch bags;
- General carry bags (i.e. gym or pool gear, picnic supplies).
Surveys carried out by the Plastics Industries Association (1992) indicated that 85% of people reused plastic shopping bags for some application, and a more recent survey carried out by Quantum for the CEPA Trust (2002) found that 75% of people reused shopping bags as bin liners or waste bags, with other reuses on top of this again.
Major supermarket chains in Australia have established a plastic shopping bag ‘take-back’ recycling system at stores. Drop-off bins are provided at many major supermarkets for used bags, which are collected for recycling. It is estimated that in 2001-2002, 180 million bags were recycled in this manner, with the majority exported for reprocessing.
Plastic Bags – Types and alternatives
During the period of the National Code of Practice for the Management of Plastic Bags Retailers (2003 – 2005) voluntary efforts by retailers achieved a significant reduction in plastic bag usage, from 5.95 billion bags in 2002 to 3.92 billion bags in 2005. In 2006 plastic bag use experienced a further fall to 3.36 billion. Much of the reduction in plastic bag usage over the past few years can be attributed to the range of alternative bags made available to shoppers.
HDPE and LDPE Bags
The types of plastic bags under threat of bans or levies are the ‘singlet’ bag, made of high density polyethylene (HDPE). ‘Boutique’ style bags are made of low density polyethylene (LDPE).
The HDPE singlet bag is generally used in supermarkets, for fresh produce, take-away food and other non-branded applications. The LDPE boutique are generally branded and used to carry higher value goods such as clothing.
Industry data indicates that 6.9 billion, of plastic shopping bags were used in Australia in 2001, with 6 billion of these being HDPE bags and 900 million LDPE bags.
Green Bags
Polypropylene or non-woven polypropylene (NWPP) is the material that is used to make ‘supermarket green bags’. It’s most common use is in the production of medical gowns, caps, masks and gloves. These are often referred to as ‘environmentally friendly’.
Polypropylene is a fossil fuel based plastic, so implications that ‘green bags’ leave no ecological footprint are untrue. However, the idea is that ‘green bags’ will contribute to waste reduction by moving away from single- use grocery and shopping bags and reducing their environmental footprint.
It remains to be seen if shoppers will recycle the bags when they start to wear out. It’s important that shoppers have facilities made available to recycle their polypropylene bags once they’ve reached their used by date.
Bio-degradable plastic bags
Unlike traditional bags that use petroleum-based resources bioplastic bags are made of cornstarch – a raw renewable material.
Although bioplastic bags are certified to be biodegradable and compostable according to Australian standards (AS4736 is the Australian standard for compostability and biodegradability), there are environmental concerns about the strain they will place on natural resources.
As well as this, there are concerns that water, soil, and crop contamination could result from the use of compost with chemical residues from biodegraded bags.
The paper bag
There are just as many protestors of the paper bag as there are supporters. Pro-paper bag messages include that they degrade quicker and are easier to recycle. However, other reports indicate it takes more than four times as much energy to manufacture a paper bag as it does to manufacture a plastic bag. As well as this, there are concerns about the impact of paper bags on trees and forests. The limited durability of paper bags has also been raised as an inconvenience to consumers.