Bin the bags
On August the 28th 2017 Kenya became the latest country to ban plastic bags. The country, which circulates 100 million plastic bags annually through supermarkets, has imposed hard-hitting sanctions against anyone found breaking the new environmental law.
Plastic bags have become nothing short of an epidemic in the East African country, with plastic waste littering the breadth of it, leading to blocked drains, loss of livestock and pollution of the Kenyan coast, in turn threatening the vast aquatic life living there. Kenya’s impressive savannah, lakes and the Great Rift Valley may all be at risk if the problem is not soon reversed.
Expert on marine litter Habib El-Habr comments on the issue of plastic pollution in our seas, “If we continue like this, by 2050, we will have more plastic in the ocean than fish.” With plastic bags taking between 500 to 1,000 years to break down we are at serious risk of damaging our planet beyond repair.
However the issue is not one reserved to Kenya, the concern should be a universal one. Recent research has concluded that around 75% of UK beaches were contaminated with deadly plastic waste. We only have to look at the Great Pacific garbage patch, a floating mass of plastic debris the size of Texas located in the Pacific Ocean, to understand the scale of the problem, and the need to make changes sooner rather than later.
The banning or taxation on single use plastic bags has taken effect in many countries including China, Italy, Rwanda, India and even the UK – with a new 5p charge being introduced in 2015. Kenya’s law is by far the most serious however, and covers the manufacture and importation of all plastic bags as well as anybody seen carrying any plastic single use carrier bag.
The penalties in place for breaking the law include fines of up to $38,000 (32,000 euros) and up to four years prison sentence. Whilst this might be alarming for local Kenyans Judy Wakhungu, Kenya's environment minister, has informed that the law will initially be aimed at manufactures and suppliers of plastic bags in an attempt to attack the problem at the source.
The law is no doubt a strong step towards a more environmentally friendly future, and a nod to the severity of the problem facing our planet. However the implantation of the law has not been met entirely with open arms. It has taken Kenya three attempts over the last decade to make the ban legal, and challenges to the ban have only now been ultimately rejected by the country’s High Court.
The main issue surrounding the ban on plastic bags comes from the Kenya Association of Manufacturers which is concerned about the impact on business as Kenya is a key exporter of plastic bags and there is likely to be some backlash for local business as Kenya adjusts. While the problems that might face these businesses in the short term are unfortunate there is no question as to the long term environmental threat plastic bags pose.
The law being passed in Kenya is viewed by most as progressive choice, and ultimately a necessary sacrifice in order to preserve our planet.
