5 Virginia jurisdictions have joined a developing trend throughout America of taxing plastic searching bags in hopes of lowering and sooner or later eradicating their use.
The bags, created as single-use merchandise, are between the most popular kinds of litter, polluting land and waterways alike and constituting a substantial part of the nation’s plastic squander.
Gradual to decompose and designed from petroleum items, the baggage pose myriad potential risks even when disposed of appropriately.
More than time, the plastic may perhaps discharge harmful substances into drinking h2o supplies or threaten maritime animals and other wildlife that consider it is food stuff.
The mid-Atlantic point out of Virginia permits any county or town to power grocery stores, pharmacies and other shops to collect a 5-cent tax on just about every plastic bag provided to customers. Arlington and Fairfax counties, alongside with the metropolitan areas of Alexandria, Fredericksburg and Roanoke, have carried out just that beginning January 1.
Initially ban in Bangladesh
Getting a stand versus plastic bags did not originate in the United States.
In 2002, Bangladesh turned the to start with state to ban thin plastic bags, which have been blamed for clogging drainage programs and contributing to catastrophic flooding.
Other international locations adopted accommodate, possibly banning them outright or taxing them to discourage their use, which ballooned to a million luggage per moment around the world in 2011, according to the United Nations.
According to Entire world Atlas, about 60 international locations have instituted plastic bag controls, such as China, India and Cambodia. A number of African countries have banned them, such as Kenya, Cameroon, Rwanda and Tanzania.
Even with this kind of initiatives, plastic baggage keep on to litter the world, from oceans to the polar ice caps to even the summit of Mount Everest.
In the United States, California was the 1st to move a statewide ban in 2014. Due to the fact then, quite a few other states, including Hawaii, New York and Oregon, have banned single-use plastic luggage.
Help is expanding in the U.S. as far more local governments be a part of the lead to.
But not everyone is on board, notably the American Recyclable Plastic Bag Alliance, a lobbying group representing the U.S. plastic bag producing and recycling market.
“Taxes on plastic baggage will drive up charges for people already having difficulties with rapidly raising grocery charges owing to prevalent inflation,” Zachary Taylor, the group’s director, said in a statement to VOA. When disposed of thoroughly, the plastic grocery bag is the carryout bag with the fewest environmental impacts, he asserted.
Local challenge
On the other hand, Ruthie Cody, who life in Alexandria, Virginia, supports making it possible for community jurisdictions to employ bag taxes.
“I don’t feel it really should be obligatory nationwide but a little something community governments need to determine,” she explained, “and the tax is minimum for the day to day consumer, but continue to consequences improve.”
By contrast, Linda Joy Wilson, a Fairfax County resident, thinks the tax must be conventional across the nation. “I’ve lived in other states with the plastic bag tax and have recognized that it cuts down on plastic luggage usage and individuals carry their individual one-use disposable plastic luggage in grocery, drug and usefulness tales,” she reported.
The counties of Arlington and Fairfax and the city of Alexandria approach to use the income generated from the bag tax to fund environmental cleanup tasks, air pollution and litter mitigation, and schooling applications.
“We count on there may possibly be some resistance to the tax,” Kate Daley, an environmental analyst for the Fairfax County authorities, instructed VOA. “But we have also viewed a whole lot of enthusiasm from individuals who feel it will make a massive difference in defending the atmosphere and assistance curb pollution in streams, trees and roadways.”
“I would like it had happened sooner,” said Patty Hagan, a Fairfax County resident. “Everyone should use reusable baggage.”
Another county resident, David Toms, agreed. “But I believe they want to ban the plastic baggage completely due to the fact they damage wildlife. I reside on a lake and it’s disgusting how frequently I see them in the water.”
But Paul Thurmond in Arlington, Virginia, doesn’t think the tax will make a large change. “People who want the baggage will buy them in any case and then just toss them out, which looks to defeat the function,” he stated.
The intention is to “get people today not to use the plastic bags” or refrain from throwing them on the floor, reported Erik Grabowsky, stable squander bureau main for Arlington, Virginia. “It’s up to people to do the proper point.”