The Italian Parliament Banned Plastic Bags. Flickr user christopher-amos
The Italian Parliament just confirmed on December 23 that effective January 1st, 2011, petroleum plastic grocery bags are banned in Italy. After a short transition period, grocery stores and other supermarkets will be fined if they do not comply with the plastic bag ban. This is a nice Christmas present offered to the bioplastic industry. This legislation has already caused tremendous demand for bags made from bioplastics in Italy.
The plastic bag ban intends to help reduce carbon dioxide emissions in the atmosphere, to strengthen environmental protection, to support the agro-industrial field of biomaterials and to achieve the goals set by the Kyoto Protocol. Bravo!
Given the failure of the original measures established by the Finance Act of 2007, The Italian Ministry for the Environment has recently established a working group to be directly involved with the categories distribution. This is an experimental program aimed at the progressive reduction of marketing bags and the adoption of a measure to regulate in more detail the introduction of the plastic bag ban. Regardless of the January 1, 2011 date, the Italian Ministry will allow distributors to “clear their stock” still in load distribution; a move that is particularly beneficial for small distributors.
The ban on production, marketing and use in case of non-biodegradable plastic bags as defined by the technical standard EN 13432:
This rule “Requirements for packaging recoverable through composting and biodegradation“, adopted in Italy under the name UNI EN 13432, defines the characteristics that a material must be defined as “compostable“. In the United States we refer to ASTM 6400-2004 to define the same characteristics.
- Biodegradability – the metabolic conversion of the compostable material into carbon dioxide;
- Disintegrability – the fragmentation and loss of vision in the final compost (absence of visual contamination);
- Low levels of heavy metals and no adverse effects on the quality of the compost (e.g., reduction of the agronomic value and presence of eco-toxicological effects on plant growth).
It is also important to remember that the UNI EN 13432 is a harmonized standard, which provides a presumption of conformity with European Directive 2004/12/EC amending Directive 94/62/EC, 94/62 EC on packaging and waste packaging.
Italian Bioplastic Bag Made from Cereplast
Let’s hope that in 2011 California will pass a similar regulation. It makes sense. It is better for the environment and it is efficient. We use a plastic grocery bag for 45 minutes and it takes 77 million years to generate one drop of fossil fuel. It is time for a change and let’s be realistic, re-useable bags are reused as long as you do not forget them, and 80% of consumers forget. Bioplastic bags provide a more eco-friendly alternative to traditional plastic grocery bags.
One realistic solution and one word for 2011: Bioplastic!
Frederic Scheer
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