The housing and local government minister says the initiative will reduce the amount of waste to be disposed and extend the lifespan of existing landfills.
A total of 20 hypermarket, supermarket, convenience stores, pharmacy, health and beauty chains will no longer provide single-use plastic bags at their 8,000 outlets from Oct 1.
Housing and local government minister Nga Kor Ming said among the retail chains are 99Speedmart, Aeon, 7-Eleven, TF Value Mart, and Guardian.
“Some have already implemented this initiative, but today they are signing a pledge to commit to doing it on a large scale starting next week."
"If customers do not bring their own bags, they can purchase recyclable bags at these stores," he told a press conference after launching the "Say No to Single-Use Plastics"
campaign here.
He added that the initiative is expected to reduce the number of single-use plastic bags by 200 million pieces every year, thereby reducing the amount of waste to be disposed of and help to extend the lifespan of existing landfills.
According to Nga, the government was burdened with the high cost of solid waste management and public cleaning, which amounted to RM2 billion annually, and so, was working on reducing its dependence on landfills.
"At present, Malaysia has 114 non-sanitary landfills and 22 sanitary landfills. The opening and upgrading of landfills require very high costs," he said.
Meanwhile, Nga said the national-level World Cleanup Day in Kuala Lumpur this Saturday is set to enter the Malaysia Book of Records as the largest gotong-royong (communal work) programme.
"Over 50,000 people and 156 local authorities are expected to participate from across the country and I hope all Malaysians will join the programme," he said.
Source: www.freemalaysiatoday.com
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