The government is inept, and will often do symbolic token gestures. Plastic is a big case in point. They are going for useless plastic bag bans, and plastic straw bans instead of the real issues.
Clothes made from recycled plastic bottles (yay recycling(?) are shedding fibers into our waters as they are washed. How is that ok?
Now just to be clear, one thing I saw in the US which I found pretty disturbing, was those small plastic bags used for fruits. Sometimes they were so low quality that they visibly shed little chunks of plastic. I'm fully behind banning those.
But as flawed as government is, I guess it's still better than nothing.
Plastic ban bags have made a huge difference in many countries. In much of the developing world, it used to be the case that discarded plastic bags were lying everywhere, flying along, stuck en masse to any barbed-wire fence, etc. Once the bans came in, the level of such pollution has visibly dropped.
Indeed. Straws were symbolic and their ban has little effect, but the bag bans are amazing and in some countries the plastic cup bans are almost as effective at reducing trash on the street.
There are environmentally beneficial effects to these but there are also significant effects on overall litter. It's like when soda can manufacturers switched their tab system to one that doesn't get discarded.
This! Plastic bag bans have been a massive quality of life improvement in nearly every city I visit regularly.
I am not sure what the impact of plastic straw bans has been. Beyond just the symbolism, however, they would have been a useful step towards reconsidering the use of all single use plastic if COVID hadn’t picked up when it did.
i totally agree. in Ireland we had a lot of grumbling about it at the time but the impact on plastic pollution in the streets and fields and roads has been massive.
plastic straw ban has little impact mostly because people tend to leave their drinks in the fast food restaurant rather than take them home. it't not as obvious that it's helping and aren't the cups coated in plastic?
Clothes made from recycled plastic bottles (yay recycling(?) are shedding fibers into our waters as they are washed. How is that ok?
Now just to be clear, one thing I saw in the US which I found pretty disturbing, was those small plastic bags used for fruits. Sometimes they were so low quality that they visibly shed little chunks of plastic. I'm fully behind banning those.
But as flawed as government is, I guess it's still better than nothing.