Specific bad habits to be addressed and transformed; the plastic bag epidemic

Singaporeans use 30 billion plastic bags a year which is a lot of plastic bags and accumulation of plastic that cannot be biodegradable (Reyes, 2013). The buring of plastic in incineration produces toxins in the air that is extremely harmful for the health of the public. The heavy reliance on plastic bags is an extremely bad habit that needs to be addressed and transformed in order to cut down on creating waste substances that cannot be broken down naturally and safely. Plastic bags consume scarce resources such as including oil in their production. An estimation of up to 100 million barrels of oil are needed to make the world’s plastic bags each year. Yet typical usage of a plastic bag is just 20 minutes (Reyes, 2013). This is not a good usage of the world’s infinite resources therefore there is a need to cut down on its usage in Singapore. I propose a nation wide movement to charge consumers 10 cents for each plastic bag that they use in order to motivate the public to stop using them too often.

Plastic bag charges have proved to be a success in countries like United Kingdom and Hong Kong, thus the government in Singapore should also follow suit imposing a levy on the use of plastic bags to cut its usage. In Northern Ireland, the number of bags issued by supermarkets fell from 190 million to 30 million in 2014 after the tax on plastic bag usage. Scotland's similar legislation in 2014 cut down plastic bag usage by 80 percent as well. There was some public outcry over having to pay for plastic bags however, the majority of the public was receptive of the change and did change their behavior in using less plastic. Thus, as it is a proven method that worked in other countries, I believe that Singaporeans too will be able to reduce the use of plastic bags dramatically if Singapore adopted the method of placing a fee for plastic use.

Major supermarket chains and retailer should be taking the lead. The problem that will arise if one major supermarket does the levy is that they will lose market share as customers will choose to shop at other supermarkets. To tackle this issue, there needs to be an island wide move to start charging Singaporeans for the use of plastic so as to motivate them to cut back on its usage by bringing their own grocery bags to shop with. Singaporeans will switch to other ways of taking their groceries home when they have a monetary incentive to do so. They could use more reusable types of bags such as a good quality canvas bag or a bag that can be recycles such as paper bags to take their groceries home, reducing the usage of plastic bags in Singapore. Paper bags can be used as a substitute for plastic bags. This will be an effective way to ensure that Singaporeans reduce their reliance on plastic bags.  

References

Lorraine Chow (5 August. 2016) Proof That Charging Customers for Plastic Bags Reduces Their Use (August. 2016)

Retrieved from:

http://www.alternet.org/environment/england-proves-charging-consumers-plastic-bags-reduces-their-use

Elga Reyes (2 October. 2013) Singapore uses 3 billion plastic bags a year: study (October. 2013)

Retrieved from:

http://www.eco-business.com/news/singapore-uses-3-billion-plastic-bags-year-study/