China Determined To be a “Beautiful” Nation

 

China announced the ban and restriction on disposable plastic products to recover the country’s environment and build a beautiful country on January 19^th. According to the joint statement of the National Development and Reform Commission and the Ministry of Ecology and Environment, China will implement the phased steps for the ban in next 5 years to reduce the production and use of disposable plastic products in the nation.

 

1. The Steps to Drive Out Single-use Plastics

China unveiled the following steps to implement the ban in the next 5 years.

 

1) By 2020

- Undegradable plastic bags and straws will be prohibited at major consumption sectors such as shopping malls, super markets, and food service areas in metropolises such as Beijing and Shanghai.

- Production and sales of disposable foam tableware and plastic swabs will be banned.

- Production of daily chemical products with microbeads will be banned.

2) By 2022

- Use of plastic bags will be completely banned in all the cities.

- Undegradable packaging will be banned in the major cities and some coastal areas.

- Reduce the consumption of disposable plastic packaging for e-commerce, express delivery service and food service and promote the alternatives

- Sales of daily chemical products with microbeads will be banned.

3) By 2025

- Use of plastic bags at bazaars in rural areas will be banned.

- Providing of disposable products in all the hotels and guest houses will be banned.

- Establish the integrated system for production, distribution, consumption, recycling and dispose of single-use plastics.

- Decrease the amount of consumption of disposable plastic cutlery by 30%

- Undegradable delivery packaging will be prohibited nationwide.

The announcement once again emphasizes the restriction on production and use of thin plastic bags (thinner than 0.025mm) and agricultural polyethylene film (thinner than 0.01mm), the ban on recycling of medical waste as well as on importing foreign plastic waste, too.

 

2. Why is China Strengthening Plastic Ban?

< Plastics Europe (2019) Plastics The Fact 2019 >

China is the world’s biggest plastic manufacturer, supplying more than 30% of global demands as well as the biggest plastic waste generator. Bloomberg delivers that Alibaba, the largest Chinese e-commerce company, uses about 1 billion packaging a day. The rapid growth of e-commerce and express delivery platforms has encouraged the country to use the plastic products relentlessly.

According to the research from Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research in Germany, among the 10 rivers carrying plastic pollutants into the ocean in the world the Yangtze river in China turned out to be on the top, releasing around 1.5 million tonnes into the ocean with the Indus river in India followed. However, the releasing amount from Indus is 9 times less than the Yangtze. The waste flows directly into the West Sea of Korea affecting the surroundings. What’s more is the plastic waste has disturbed and destroyed the ecosystem while causing serious environmental pollution around the world.

China, then, declared the restriction on importing foreign waste in 2018, putting the world in chaos. The populous country has been known as the biggest products suppliers and consuming markets, but ironically has also been blamed for the main cause of plastic pollution. Now, China shows its determined will to be off from its bad name with the new environmental policy. If the plan properly works, the global packaging industry is expected to be greatly affected.

 

3. Various Response to China’s Green Policy

The announcement of China surprised the world. It’s because the policy is aiming to establish a comprehensive sustainable system, not limited to controlling and managing of the production and sales of disposable plastics. The plan allows different adjusting time for each industry and area for implementation so that it may minimize the confusion in a society.

There are some worries that the cost may increase and the supply wouldn’t be sufficient in a short-term until the quality of the alternatives is verified and the production is stabilized. However, people still show faith in the plan as it states that governmental departments will prepare the relevant policies.

Meanwhile, the public in the US who has as much high reliance on plastic products as China strongly criticizes their complacent status in the relevant policy. Except for a few states, their regulation mainly focuses on cleaning the waste instead of planning the reduction of the plastic use, and shift the responsibility on enterprises and consumers.

Although Korean government has tried many plastic-free policies, the management and process has also been evaluated to be confusing and poorly handled. China’s movement banning the production or use of common products in such a short period appears to be drastic and amazing. As there are many industries closely associated with China, we will pay attention on the situation, too.

 

4. The Path to Walk Together towards Resource Circulation

Considering the scale of the country, this urgent switch of the overall flow of industries may only be possible with the nation’s unique operation system, socialism. Unfortunately, it is now questionable how China is going to manage this new regulation as they have been getting worldwide unpleasant attention due to the coronavirus. However, we believe they will certainly be able to make the nation “Beautiful” if they establish the integrated system for the entire process from the production to recycling of a product and a subject in each industry cooperates for the reduction.