THERE was some nuts to crack on Earth Day at midweek when environment stakeholders revisited familiar hunting grounds, relating to the persistent circulation of what they describe as single-use plastics.

 Their focus on on the need to promote reusable packaging materials as they are more suited to fight pollution, which was surprising to a number of those who heard the demand, as single use plastics were banned back in 2016. It is a question of reinventing that category of plastics, by imputing it to all transparent plastic packaging material

The single use material that was abundant eight years ago was one that was skimpy, small in size and with handles, particularly used in wrapping fast food at various street eateries, What there is at present is non-handled, plastic or mixed type material whose visible quality is its transparency, a mark that is needed in many things in shops and markets.

 And they are also reused in the sense that they store things in homesteads, with just a slight chance of being thrown away after packaging, chiefly because they aren’t used in food carrying.

Still there is a minor category of plastics that appear to fit the bill in what environmental stakeholders are asserting, namely tiny plastic covering after the usual aluminum laced food wrapping paper has been used, but admittedly many take away joints cover the wrapped aluminum paper with khaki paper. 

One has to go to joints or spots selling yams, potatoes or sugar and other edibles in shops which aren’t covered by special wrapping paper, with an additional qualify that they aren’t scattered all over the place. It wraps things that are likely to be taken to a homestead or such other, and disposed of like other dirt, not thrown about, in which case the little items are collected with their household trash for routine disposal, and would not in themselves spark a visible environmental concern.

Explanations that ‘investing in efforts to eliminate single-use plastics will greatly help protect the earth from plastic pollution’ was sort of far flung, as this is dirt that is collected in households, not thrown about in open air.

 During the single use ban campaign it was pointed that due to the usually dark or blue bags with handles being scattered, they were at times munched by domestic animals and harmed them. Well, there are no such dangers lurking at present, and the only parameter is effectiveness of waste collection, as that is too often poor.

At the same time there is room to worry that regulators may seek allies in activist organisations to put old wine into new bottles, allowing them to start another campaign disrupting shop and market activity, whereas the wrapping industry years back shifted to reuse bags that have handles. 

There is a brazen preoccupation with plastics and anyone who peddles them, and a wish to add taxes or levies against this group, just to cover up local government laxity in picking up wastes, where it is easier to complain about the manufacturers. The background was collecting wastes along the beach on Earth Day, and it was discovered that plastics endanger marine life, and thus the need to curb them.