CNA – Indonesia will start imposing a ban on single-use plastic products by the end of 2029, Environment and Forestry Minister Siti Nurbaya Bakar said on Monday.
By that time, manufacturers are also mandated to reduce their use of plastic packaging by 30 per cent.
Siti Nurbaya said the ban will include single-use plastic shopping bags, plastic straws and plastic cutlery while the use of styrofoams for food packaging will also be prohibited.
“This is a way to deal with packaging wastes that are difficult to collect, have no economical value, hard to recycle and have the potential to pollute (the environment),” the minister was quoted as saying by Indonesian news agency Antara.
Various studies and reports have named Indonesia as one of the top plastic waste producing countries.
Last year, the country produced 12.6 million tonnes of plastic waste, according to data from Indonesia’s Environment Ministry.
The minister said provinces will be instructed to produce a plastic waste reduction road map in support of the ban.
