Key takeaways:
- Ban has straws, takeout receptacles, grocery bags, cutlery, stir sticks, and plastic rings.
- Canadians will require to find options for plastic straws and grocery bags by the end of the year.
The federal government is restricting firms from importing or making plastic bags and takeout containers by the end of this year, from vending them by the end of next year, and from shipping them by the end of 2025.
The move will also impact single-use plastic straws, stir sticks, cutlery, and six-pack rings to hold cans and bottles together.
“Our government is all-in when it arrives at easing plastic pollution,” Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault stated Monday at a press conference on a St. Lawrence River beach in Quebec City.
The Liberal government has fixed 2030 as the target date for stopping the flow of plastic waste in landfills or as litter on beaches, rivers, wetlands, and forests.
Read more: The city of Edmonton is on track to surpass four-year affordable housing marks
Federal data reveal that in 2019, 15.5 billion plastic grocery bags, 4.5 billion pieces of plastic cutlery, three billion stir sticks, 5.8 billion straws, 183 million six-pack rings, and 805 million takeout containers were sold in Canada.
Bags, takeout containers, and straws are among the top 10 things most normally found during shoreline and beach cleanups in Canada, along with bottles, bottle caps, coffee cups, and cigarette butts.
A 2019 Deloitte study showed that less than one-tenth of Canadians’ plastic waste is recycled. That meant 3.3 million tonnes of plastic were thrown out yearly, nearly half of plastic packaging.
Sarah King, head of the oceans and plastics campaign for Greenpeace Canada, said barring the six things is a step but disputes Guilbeault’s claim that it shows Canada is all-in on ending plastic waste.
Source – cbc.ca
