Paphos People

The cabinet on Tuesday decided to ban all disposable thin plastic carrier bags at points of sale to protect the environment from plastic waste.

Following the imposition of a charge on such bags in July 2018, the cabinet has now approved a change to the packaging laws to ban the bags outright.

The new draft regulation, which was preceded by a public consultation, will cover all points of sale, including home delivery, a cabinet announcement said.

According to Agriculture Minister Costas Kadis, who proposed the amendment, “the ban on the placement of thin plastic carry bags at points of sale will further raise awareness of citizens and especially the future generation around of the benefits of reducing the production of plastic waste in the environment”.

“Today’s decision is another decisive step towards tackling the problem of environmental pollution from plastic bags,” a cabinet announcement said.

In addition, it harmonises Cyprus with the general trend now adopted at European level to further reduce the use of plastic and ban certain disposable
It said that since charges for the bags were introduced in 2018, Cyprus had seen an 80 per cent reduction in the use of plastic bags at points of sale.

“By banning the disposal of the thin plastic carrying bag at points of sale, the public will now have sole responsibility for transporting their products in other ways,” the announcement added.

The new regulations will enter into force after being passed by the House.

https://cyprus-mail.com/2020/12/22/cabinet-approves-ban-on-disposable-plastic-carrier-bags/

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Dave
Moira And Dave

“I know that you believe you understand what you think I said, but I'm not sure you realize that what you heard is not what I meant.”

I dont see the fact bags and packaging are made of plastic being a serious problem , single use and difficult to recycle is the problem . Imagine if everbody used a carrier bag twice, it would halve the world consumption . Multi use and easy recyclability, this goes for all types of packging.
Just think if every plastic bottle was replaced with a single use glass bottle , we would have a serious glass problem !
Also follow a lead made by other eu countries. Put a deposit on bottles, return them to a recycle point and they pay you, so even when bottles are dumped it's not long before they are picked up !