Single-use plastic remains omnipresent around the world

Negotiators hope to reach a first global treaty against plastic pollution in 2024, but in five very different countries, single-use plastic remains hugely popular as a cheap and convenient choice, illustrating the challenges ahead.

On a Bangkok street lined with street vendors, customers queue for Maliwan’s famous treats. Steamed cakes are placed in clear plastic bags, next to rows of pudding in plastic boxes. This small business founded 40 years ago uses at least two kilos of single-use plastic every day.

Thailand began limiting single-use plastics before the covid pandemic by asking major retailers to stop handing out free bags. But this policy has largely remained a dead letter and street food vendors have hardly adopted it.

Thailand produces two million tonnes of plastic waste per year. The World Bank estimates that 11% of this waste is not collected and is burned, thrown on the ground or dumped into rivers and oceans.

In Obalende market, in the heart of Lagos, empty water sachets litter the ground. Every day, Lisebeth Ajayi sees dozens of customers tear the “pure water” sachets with their teeth and drink. “They can’t afford to buy bottled water,” explains this 58-year-old woman, who sells bottles and sachets of water, soap and sponges.

Since their emergence in the 1990s, water sachets have become a major pollutant across much of Africa, but they remain popular for drinking, cooking and washing.

Lagos banned single-use plastic in January, but the impact has been limited so far. The United Nations estimates that up to 60 million water sachets are thrown away every day in Nigeria.

Every day, vendors walk the sands of Rio de Janeiro’s beaches, carrying metal containers filled with mate, a tea-like drink. The frozen beverage is handed out in plastic cups to sunbathers crowding the waterfront.

“Drinking mate is part of the culture of Rio de Janeiro,” says Arthur Jorge da Silva, on the lookout for customers. He recognizes the environmental impact of his plastic cup towers, in a country ranked fourth producer of plastic waste in 2019. But “it’s complicated” to find affordable alternatives, he says. According to him, mate sellers on the beach have been using plastic for as long as he can remember.

Trash bins along Rio’s beaches receive some 130 tonnes of waste per day, but the plastic is not sorted and only 3% of Brazilian waste is recycled each year.

In France, plastic cups, straws and forks have certainly almost disappeared, but one item is holding up: the bag. “A bag? And there you have it.” On the Aligre market in Paris, around twenty stalls have the same configuration: fruits, vegetables and a slew of plastic bags. Laurent Benacer, a market gardener for 35 years, gets his supplies “in boxes of 2000, at 24 euros each, they last me a week”.

Most are stamped “reusable and 100% recyclable”. Because although single-use plastic bags have been banned in France since 2016, reusable bags (made of slightly thicker plastic), biosourced or compostable bags can still be distributed.

“Biosourced (editor’s note: based on natural raw materials) has absolutely no interest. What is important is biodegradability in natural conditions,” indicates Nathalie Gontard, of the National Research Institute for Agriculture, Food and the Environment (INRAE).

At Allo Beirut restaurant in Dubai, plastic containers are stacked, waiting to be filled and delivered across the city. “We receive more than 1,200 orders per day,” assures Mohammed Chanane, delivery manager, specifying that we use “plastic boxes because they are more airtight and preserve the food better.”

With few pedestrians and often scorching weather, Dubai’s 3.7 million residents rely on delivery for everything from gasoline to coffee. People in the UAE produce one of the highest volumes of waste per capita in the world and single-use plastic makes up 40% of all plastic used in the country.

Since June, single-use plastic bags and many similar items have been banned. Polystyrene containers will follow next year.