1. IntroductionSince the plastic shopping bag was introduced in 1957, it has becomes an essential part of life today. In addition to common things like smart phones, cars or fast food, plastic shopping bags are very familiar and used by everyone in Australia. Almost all merchandises from foodstuffs and take away food, drink to clothing and hardware use plastic shopping bags to carry.It is estimated that people all over the world use from 500 billion to 1 trillion plastic every year (Clapp & Swanston 2009). This is equivalent to 2.7 billion every day, or 1.9 million every minute. And approximately 6.9 billion plastic bags are used by Australian consumers every year.Plasticshopping bags are provided by most retailers in Australia for the purpose ofhelping consumers to hold their products they buy. While the main intention of consumersis using these plastic shopping bags is to carry goods from the stores to thecar and into their home , they are often re-used by consumers for otherpurposes, such as lining household rubbish bins. The helpfulness of plasticshopping bags for their original purpose is rarely controversial. However, thesebags create unsightly rubbish, use limited resources, are one of the sources ofwaste from landfill, take many years to disintegrate, cause harm to animals,and become a symbol of a throwaway society.Thepurpose of this research paper is to analysis existing policies about plasticshopping bag restriction in Australia. 2. Background and Literature reviewAccordingto Hyder Consulting (2008), there are two major types of plastic shopping bagswhich are used in Australia: Singlet bags, or lightweight plastic bags, made of high density polyethylene (HDPE) used mostly in supermarkets, fresh produce, convenience stores and take-away food outlets, and other non-branded applications.Boutique bags made of low density polyethylene (LDPE) usually branded and used by stores selling higher value goods such as department stores, clothing and shoe outlets.Over the past decade, attention of politics has concentrated on reducing the use of plastic shopping bags for a variety of reasons. They are harmful to animals and the environment and reduce the attractiveness of urban, rural and natural scenery. Plastic bags and debris of bags can stay in the environment for hundreds of years. Plastic bags are also an unnecessary consumable symbol. There are a number of suggestions proposed to reduce or stop the use of plastic bags, including plastic bags, introducing levy a tax on manufacture of plastic bags and using alternatives, with strengths and weaknesses. For example, according to Hyder Consulting (2008), recent alternative replacement life cycles for plastic bags, such as the current generation of decomposers, have found a number of alternatives that have a greater impact on environment in comparison with lightweight plastic bags.Thereare some reasons why it has been suggested that plastic shopping bags should bereduced. Halweil (2004) indicated that man people consider plastic shoppingbags as a waste of natural resources because they are made from non-renewableresources, such as crude oil, natural gas and other petro chemical derivatives,are normally unnecessary. And Williams (2004) argued that in a lot ofsituations, many people use plastic shopping bags only one time. In addtion,according to Hyder Consulting (2008), there is a key reason for thedepreciation of plastic shopping bags. It is that millions of them are notthrown away properly and they become unsightly litter which can live long onland or in the water for hundreds of years. While nearly 30-40 million plasticshopping bags were littered in 2007, the Keep Australia Beautiful NationalLitter Index 2006/2007 showed that HDPE plastic bags accounted for only 1.3% ofthe litter stream by item (excluding cigarette butts) and 0.18% of the litterstream by volume (excluding cigarette butts). It was found that beaches hadthe most plastic bags, of the beaches surveyed by keep Australia Beautiful, 2.9plastic bags were found per 1,000 square metres (Hyder Consulting 2008, p.22).Anotherreason for the need to reduce plastic shopping bags is that they are dangerousto wildlife. Jefic, Sheavly and Adler (2009) pointed out that plastic shoppingbags can do harm or kill flora and fauna that eat, or become entangled in them.Williams (2004) gave an example that turtles died due to ingesting plasticbags, most likely the plastic bags look like jellyfish floating in the water.Another example is that a crocodile which was caught at Magnetic Island inQueensland in October 2008 died because of eating plastic bags, which werestuck in its stomach, meaning it could not digest its food. Its necropsyrevealed 25 plastic shopping abd garbage bags, a plastic wine cooler bag and arubber float in its stomach (Queensland Government 2008). In addtion,Sustainability Victoria (2010) illustrated plastic shopping bags as a shortterm convenience with long term impacts. In spite of the fact that plasticshopping bags are made to be single use, Lapidos (2007) considered thatplastic shopping bags have a life expectancy of up to 1,000 years. Moreover,many people think that plastic shopping bags are symbolic of wasteful society.The Hon Jane Davidson AM, the Welsh Environment Minister (2009) describedplastic shopping bags as an iconic symbol of the throw-away society we nowseem to live in. Wilton (cited in Williams 2004), a waste campaigner forFriends of the Earth in London, also said plastic carrier bags are symbolic ofa society in which we use things without thinking and then throw them away.And according to Caroline Williams in New Scientist in 2004, the plastic bagindustry claimed that it is being targeted by environmentalists because plasticbags are an easy and emotive target that panders to our guilt about generalenvironmental irresponsibility. 3. Problem definitionPeopleliving in Australia use approximately 6.9 billion new plastic shopping bagseach year. In other words, each person use one bag in a day. The problems ofplastic shopping bags are determined by two factors that are almost certainlyequally important. First of all, there are concerns about the environmentalimpacts of plastic shopping bags, especially impacts on the consumption ofresources and litter.Lewiset al. (2002) stated that the manufacture of 6.9 billion plastic shopping bagsutilizes approximately 36850 tonnes of plastic, or 2% of total plasticsproduced in Australia each year. This is a slight percentage of the entireamount of packaging used in Australia every year, which is estimated to bearound 3 million tonnes 1 . There is an estimation that plastic shopping bagsaccount for 2.02% of all items in the litter stream. However, they pose actualecological impacts and threats and as such need to be effectively addressedtogether with other components of the litter stream. Thesecond factor that are necessary to be aware of in the argument about plastic shoppingbags is symbolic value. The plastics and packaging industries are under extremepressure in the 1970s and 1980s because they had become a politicallyincorrect symbol of the threat to the environment (Byars 1995). A culturalanalysis of plastics in the United States indicated that by definition the plastics industry wasthe whole thing which activists in ecology wanted to delete from the Americanexperience. Since the early twentieth century, people who promote the industrialchemistry and synthetic materials had bragged of going beyond age-old limits ofprovisional materials by spreading the control of science over nature. Duringthe 1920s, predictions of a developing flow of low-cost man-made goods hadsuggested material plenty as the foundation for a utopian social equality. Bythe final third of the century that transcendency threatened to drain naturalresources and contaminate the society that supported it by creating a stream ofirretrievable, unacceptable materials rubbish, societys excrement. (Meikle1995). To some extent the concerns about the large number of plastic shoppingbags, which are used by people living in Australia, and their high level ofvisibility in domestic waste and litter, are characteristic of much widerconcerns about plastics and packaging. Thisdoes not mean that concerns about plastic shopping bags are any less crucial ordemanding from a policy viewpoint. However, it has the meaning that the growthof policy solutions needs to consider the issues of society and culture as wellas the facts of science about impacts on the environment. Policy measures todecrease utilization (or impacts) of shopping bags are to be expected to bewell received in the community. Abundant measures to solve the plastic bagproblem have been increased in recent times. These measures are various andinclude factors, such as legislated measures like levies and bans; voluntarymeasures such as retailer originated actions and developed Code of Practice;raised consumer education; and expanded recovery and recycling.4. Existing PoliciesThepolicy Phase-out of lightweight plastic bags in Australia is being followedat local and state/territory level rather than nationally. In this policy,plastic bag bans are implemented or undecided in all states and territoriesexcept New South Wales. Cormack (2016) noted that environmental groups haveexpressed their interest that Australia was falling behind other countries inthe phase-out of lightweight plastic bags, including Botswana, Somalia andTanzania. The author also indicated that of the 5 billion plastic bags consumedevery year by Australians, 150 million finished as litter. Accordingto Mail & Guardian in 2003, the Tasmanian town of Coles Bay was the firstlocation in Australia to ban plastic bags. Feneley (2008) stated that eventhough the Rudd Governments goal of a national plastic bag ban by years endwas publicized by the then-Environment Minister Peter Garrett, he later stopinitiative because of cost of living concerns and disagreement about the policyamong state and territory governments. This is the reason why states andterritories carried out their own approaches. Theinitiation of the Zero Waste program in South Australia led to the firststatewide lightweight bag ban being, which was introduced in October 2008. Itis estimated that this move has saved 400 million bags every year (Zero WasteSouth Australia 2011). Preiss (2017) pointed out that the most recentjurisdiction to pronounce a ban on plastic bags is Victoria, to commence on adate to be pulicized in early 2018. On 1 November 2011, following a transitionperiod of four months, plastic bags were prohibited in the Australian CapitalTerritory under the Plastic Shopping Bags Ban Act 2010. The provisions of theAct mirror the South Australia legislation. The Act was carried out in combinationwith a complete community and retailer engagement and campaign of education. On16 April 2013, Getting Full Value: The Victorian Waste and Resource RecoveryPolicy was released by the Victorian Government. The policy commits theGovernment to work under the National Waste Policy and Australian PackagingCovenant to control packaging waste, which contains lightweight plastic bags.InJuly 2017, Coles and Woolworths, which are two largest supermarkets in thecountry, announced that from July 2018 they will voluntarily take away freelightweight plastic bags from their stores and provide bags, which can bereuseable instead. These bags were originally sold at 15 cents in both Colesand Woolworths. 5. Evaluation existing policiesThe phase-out of lightweightplastic bags in Australia can be seen as aneffective and easy way of reducing the amount of plastic entering the land andthe marine environment. Keep Australia Beautifuls national report for2016-2017 showed a fall in plastic bag litter after plastic bags came intoeffect. Besides, plastic bags are offen mistaken for food by marine animals. AsWilliams (2004) mentioned that turtles died beause of eating plastic bags. Therefore,the plastic shopping bags ban can help to decrease negative impacts on animals.Moreover, bcecause plastic bags take hundreds of years to decompose, banningplastic shopping bags will help to protect the environment. One aspect that needs to beaddressed when banning plastic shopping bags is relevance. Plastic shopping bagban can be useful in short term. Professor Sami Kara from the University of NewSouth Wales said that it is better in the long term if people do not useplastic bags at all. However, it is very difficult to stop everyone from usingplastic shopping bags. Because people are now accustomed to using plasticshopping bags, it will be a big challenge to change that long-term behaviour ofconsumers. Therefore, banning plastic shopping bags are relevant in the shortterm. There are some alternativesto plastic bags. However, these can lead to some side-effects. Chung(2017) indicated that a side-effect of the plastic bag ban noticed in SouthAustralia was the growth in the number of binliners, which have a greater impact on theenvironment than plastic bags because they can not break down well in modernlandfills. The author also stated that alternatives, which are environmentallyfriendly recommended instead of bin liners are composting foodscraps and using free community newspapers asliners instead. Adler (2016) pointed out that paper bagswere not as environmentally friendly as plastic bags because of a higher carbon footprint. Inthe same way, bags made by cotton were inappropriate due to the high levelusing of the pesticides and high volume of water, which are necessary toproduce them. The greenest option was to consume recycled plasticbags. Concern has been expressed about potentiallyunintentional adverse health outcomes related to the plastic bag ban rolloutbecause of the insufficient care by consumers in keeping alternative shoppingbags in a clean and healthy condition. It is indicated that experiences ofoversea in locations such as SanFrancisco, where raise sickness and even deaths werereported in the consequences of the same bans to those in Australian states,recommend that this is a real concern (Knaus 2013). 6. ConclusionThe Environment Protection and HeritageCouncil indicated that plastic shopping bags are popular with consumers andretailers because they provide a convenient, highly functional, lightweight,strong, cheap, hygienic way to transport food and other products. Thesecomment means that several plastic shopping bags are reused for many otherpurposes, such as storing sweaty gym gear, packing shoes, collecting dog pooand holding rubbish. Inspite of these usefulness of plastic shopping bags, they have various negativeeffects. Therefore, there are polices provided to ban plastic shopping bags. Thepolices of banning plastic shopping bags were provided in South Australia,Victoria, the Australian Capital Territory and the two largest supermarkets inAustralia applied this policy to reduce the number of plastic shopping bags.These policies bring some effectiveness, positive impacts and relevance in theshort term. However, in consideration of the long term, banning plasticshopping bags is not appropriate. And the policies of plastic bags ban resultin alternatives, which have some side-effects. Reference ListAdler, B (2016), Banning Plastic Bags is Great for the Workd, Right? Not So Fast, WIRED, 10 June, viewed 23 January 2018,
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