Garbage woes: Plastic bags gathered from the river near Sungai Pinang in George Town, Penang, last Wednesday. — LIM BENG TATT/The Star
GEORGE TOWN: Plastic bags and straws remain the most common trash to be found in Penang despite efforts to restrict their use for years.
With no end in sight yet, a deeper commitment is needed to tackle such waste, especially from sources, said Penang Green Council (PGC) general manager Josephine Tan.
Zero plastic bags given out by appointed business operators are an effective way, she said.
“It will have a direct impact on reducing the amount of plastic bags entering the waste stream.
“According to our study, land-based sources account for 80% of marine litter.
“So reducing waste from the source will have a direct impact on reducing marine debris,” she said yesterday.
Josephine said campaigns launched by the state are among ways to raise awareness of and reduce waste from plastic use.
Penang food packaging sellers were no longer allowed to sell purely polystyrene food packaging since many years ago, they can only sell paper-based ones, designed to disintegrate after a few months.
While hawkers and coffee shops are “excused” for now, restaurants and more upscale establishments are strongly encouraged to provide patrons with paper and even pasta-based drinking straws.
A “no plastic bag” campaign, she said, is a good way to raise awareness of the environmental impact of plastic pollution, which could cause marine pollution due to leakage during the disposal part.
“On top of no plastic bags, we are also promoting reusable alternatives in order to prevent plastics from ending up in the ocean.
“It helps in cultivating a culture of reusing bags, reducing reliance on single-use plastic bags, and eventually a change of mindset and consumption behaviour,” she said.
Among the major efforts that Penang has taken is the No Plastic Bag campaign launched in 2009, which prohibits hypermarkets, supermarkets, department stores, convenience stores, fast-food restaurants, petrol stations and pharmacies from providing free plastic bags on Mondays.
In 2010, a survey found that, on average, each major supermarket has reduced its usage of 20,000 plastic bags every month.
The campaign has expanded in stages, and since 2021, businesses have been prohibited from providing plastic bags from Monday to Wednesday, and imposed a RM1 charge for each bag from Thursday to Sunday.
However, the ban has yet to apply to hawkers and traders.
Researchers from Universiti Sains Malaysia’s Centre for Marine and Coastal Studies (Cemacs) continue to find a great amount of plastic waste strewn on beaches.
“Plastic bags, bottles and straws were the most common types of trash found along the beach, besides cigarette butts and other items,” said its director Prof Datuk Dr Aileen Tan.
At a 500m coastal stretch in Bayan Lepas, where researchers have been collecting data from beach clean-up activities over the past four years, sightings of plastic waste have dropped, but not significantly so.
In 2020, plastic bags and straws accounted for 37.3 and 13.3 pieces per person per km respectively.
The numbers remained stable in 2021, with 11.7 plastic bags and 12.3 straws within the same parameter of study.
However, last year, the number of plastic bags increased to 16.5 while the number of straws spiked to 80.8 pieces per person per km.
Fortunately, this year, the numbers declined again to 6.1 and 17.2 pieces of plastic bags and straws respectively.
