Environment | MOP1 per plastic bag policy enters public discussion

Environmental authorities are seeking public opinions over their new policy to curb citizens’ and tourists’ use of plastic bags while shopping, according to a media briefing on the content of the public consultation yesterday.
The new policy, which will charge plastic bag users at least MOP1 per bag if the legislative assembly approves the law, has come after years of deliberation.
According to research commissioned by the Environmental Protection Bureau to assist its policymaking, Macau’s annual consumption of indecomposable bags has reached 400.5 million bags, with each resident contributing to the quantity at a rate of 2.2 bags every day.
Over 60 percent of the survey’s respondents agreed that there is an overreliance on shopping bags, and 70 percent of those respondents believe that the majority of such bags are made of plastic.
Travellers are another major consumer group of plastic bags, adding to consumption by another 50 million every year.
Over half the citizens and retailers surveyed expressed support for the levy on plastic bag use.
“Hopefully the policy will help reduce the use of plastic bags and encourage people to think twice before they ask for shopping bags,” said Ieong Kin Si, who heads the department of promotion and education in the Bureau.
The agency aims to adopt the policy, which it regards as “intimidating enough and bearable for citizens”, to reduce the annual consumption by half once it is enacted.
Only supermarkets, convenience stores, pharmacies, shopping malls, food and beverage, souvenir shops, bakeries, and cosmetics stores will be subject to the prospective regulation, the authorities suggest.
“They are the seven types of shops most frequented by citizens and where plastic bags were requested,” the Bureau’s director Vai Hoi Iong further explained.
In addition, the profits from the levies will pass intothe above businessmen’s pockets, who the authorities believe would invest in environmental protection efforts in return.
“Those merchants do not sell plastic bags for profit, and we don’t expect to see the charges made,” said the bureau’s head. “We hope that the money could be spent on environment protection.”
Wet markets, another venue that sees massive consumption of plastic bags on a daily basis, are not among the targets subject to the clampdown.
It was also revealed that, in working out a fine for law violators, the authorities would take reference from the policies of Hong Kong and Taiwan, which punish shops violating their own regulation with respective fines of HKD2,000 and around MOP1,600 respectively.
The policy, which will be in open discussion until February 5 2016, allows the use of plastic bags for free if the items contained require protection by the plastic bags for the purposes of “hygiene” and “food safety”, the authorities stressed.
Government officials expect that it could take up to one or two years for the levy on plastic bag use to be legalized after half a year of consolidating the submitted opinions.