Sales of plastic bag in England’s seven supermarkets have fallen by 86% since the introduction of a 5p charge policy by the UK Government in 2015, according to new government data.
Image: Marine litter. Photo: courtesy of Thinkstock/ © Crown copyright.
The retailers include Asda, Marks and Spencer, Morrisons, Sainsbury, The Co-operative Group, Tesco and Waitrose.
As per the new figures, customers bought nearly a quarter fewer carrier bags in 2017/18 compared to the previous year. This represents a decrease of nearly 300 million bags.
Welcoming the new figures, UK Environment Secretary Michael Gove said: “These figures demonstrate the collective impact we can make to help the environment by making simple changes to our daily routines. We want businesses to continue to look at what they can do to help improve our environment to leave it in a better state than we found it.
“It is only by working together we will reverse the rising tide of plastic waste finding its way into our rivers, seas and oceans and the catastrophic impact this is having on our marine environment.”
The new figures also shows that 5p plastic bag sale for 2017/18 had contributed nearly £60m toward charities and other good causes.
According to a study by Cefas, about 9 billion plastic bags were taken out of circulation since the 5p charge on plastic bags was introduced, and has resulted in reduction of an estimated 50% in plastic bag marine litter.
Cefas marine litter scientist Thomas Maes said: “Since efforts from across Europe came into effect, including the UK’s 5p charge, we have observed a sharp decline in the percentage of plastic bags captured by fishing nets on our trawl surveys of the seafloor around the UK as compared to 2010.”
Recently, the UK Government unveiled new measures to eliminate all avoidable plastic waste which included ban on microbead and proposals to extend the 5p plastic bag charge.
The government also announced plans to ban the sale of plastic straws, stirrers and cotton buds, in an effort to tackle plastic pollution.