The Plastic Ban Movement: What’s the Impact?

The plastic ban movement refers to the policies in many cities and countries right now to ban all plastic products in daily use. Such a change has impacts seen widely across the daily lives of people.

For example, one obvious change features how plastic straws used in beverage and bubble tea shops have been changed to PLA straws that are biodegradable and more environmentally friendly. Also, the use of plastic bags have decreased markedly and have been replaced with a surge in paper or fabric bags in grocery shopping.

This is necessary because of the huge, negative impacts plastics can cast on our environment. Once they accumulate in the oceans, they can cause animals to mistaken them as food and suffocate animals or harm their digestive systems. The great pacific garbage patch is an example of how the overwhelming amount of plastic products humans generate today can lead to devastating environmental consequences.

Not only does the plastic ban mitigate our environmental issues, it has also shown great promise in incentivizing economic activity and creating new jobs or innovation opportunities. One example, again, features the rise in use of PLA straws and other alternative products once the plastic ban has been put in place. This example shows us that environmental policies does not always lead to reduction in economic growth rate and should not be perceived as a threat to economic development. Instead, it is important to consider both environmental and economical factors when designing policies and make sure that the development we achieve are done so in a sustainable way.