“EDITORIAL : One plastic cup at a time

The Environmental Protection Administration (EPA) deserves to be applauded for its recent initiative to encourage consumers to bring their own cups instead of using disposable plastic or paper cups at fast food outlets, convenience stores and beverage shops.

The EPA’s “own-cup policy” encourages shops to offer discounts to customers who bring their own cups and one month after the policy was initiated on May 1, officials said about 4.4 percent of customers were using their own cups.

Department of Waste Management Deputy Director Lai Ying-ying (賴瑩瑩) said that people in Taiwan use an average of 1.5 billion disposable cups every year. In other words, a decrease of 4.4 percent is the equivalent of 66 million fewer cups a year being thrown into the garbage.

Not a bad start, but that’s all it is: a start.

Sixty-six million seems like a big number, but it’s a small dent out of 1.5 billion.

Moreover, there is no way of knowing how long this policy will continue or whether it will be expanded. The EPA does not have the best track record when it comes to getting people to stop using disposable products.

Nearly 10 years ago, the agency initiated a campaign to decrease the use of plastic shopping bags by getting stores to charge for them. Unfortunately, the results fell far short of expectations. At NT$1 or NT$2 per bag at chain stores such as 7-Eleven or Wellcome, few people appeared too concerned about paying out the additional cash. In addition, the newer bags were made with much more plastic than the older bags and nobody enforced the rules on smaller stores, street stands, fruit stalls and just about everywhere else where carrier bags are often freely handed out. Billions of plastic bags are still given out every year.

However, the EPA needed to start somewhere. If it is now going to get serious about teaching people in Taiwan ethical habits regarding the use of disposable goods, it should not stop at encouraging small discounts at stores that are willing to participate. After the policy has been implemented for a while and customers are accustomed to the discounts, the EPA could widen the policy to include stores that were not part of the original plan, even making participation mandatory.

A logical next step would be to encourage stores to increase the discount, to make bringing one’s own cup more attractive.

The ultimate goal has to be to encourage as many people as possible to bring their own cups and any policy that works toward that goal should be encouraged and applauded. However, the government must not be allowed to ease up on implementing the policy, as was the case with the plan to phase out the use of plastic bags, which simply never came to fruition.

People all over the world use far too many plastic cups, utensils, food containers, bags and bottles. Although a good portion of them are recycled or incinerated, a huge amount of plastic winds up in the oceans, where it breaks down into a toxic soup of plastic particles that is in some places double the size of the US state of Texas.

Ultimately, asking individuals to voluntarily cut back on using disposable goods is not enough. The EPA and other government agencies must step up efforts to encourage people in Taiwan to adopt ethical habits when it comes to the environment.”

 

http://taipeitimes.com/News/editorials/archives/2011/06/17/2003505964

 

Personally I think the use of plastic bags could be reduced more efficiently if employees were required to only hand out a bag if specifically asked by he customer. And the staff in tea shops could ask whether the customer brought their own reusable cup.