New York plastic bag tax would stifle recycling - ACC

04 February 2009 01:48  [Source: ICIS news]

HOUSTON (ICIS news)--A proposed $100m (€78m) plastic bag tax in New York City’s draft 2010 budget would undermine the city’s existing bag recycling program by driving consumers to use tax-free paper bags, an American Chemistry Council (ACC) official said on Tuesday.

“We don’t see [the bag tax] as a workable solution to dealing with litter or waste. We support an overall waste management approach of reusing and recycling bags,” said Shari Jackson, director of the Progressive Bag Affiliates (PBA), which represents plastic-bag suppliers and recyclers covering 90% of the US market.

The budget proposal would place a 5-cent tax on each plastic grocery and retail bag.

A similar tax in Ireland cut the use of plastic grocery bags by 90%, but consumers ended up spending more on other types of plastic bags, such as those used for garbage can liners, Jackson said.

New York’s proposed bag tax would likewise drive shoppers from plastic to paper, discouraging plastic bag recycling efforts, she said.

New York City’s bag recycling program has been in effect since July 2008 and should be given more time to work, Jackson said. The state of New York implemented its own recycling program in December.

Plastic bag and film recycling increased by 24% to a record high of 812m lb (368,000 tonnes) in 2006, according to the ACC.

($1 = €0.78)

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By: David Barry
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