Walang Plastikan: Plastic’s place in the new normal

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AS parts of the country are placed under varying degrees of quarantine schemes, this has caused a surge on the usage of single-use plastic due to various reasons including a need for affordable, disposable or easy-to-clean packaging. A rise in packaged deliveries for households under lockdown has also been seen.

“We are seeing a shift in consumption patterns. More people are opting for deliveries and that will only mean that there is more plastic packaging usage to be expected, especially for food packaging,” said Crispian Lao, president of the Philippine Alliance for Recycling and Materials Sustainability (PARMS).

PARMS is a non-profit multi-stakeholder organization that aims to develop and implement a comprehensive waste management program to increase resource recovery, such as plastics and other packaging materials, and reduce landfill dependence leading towards a zero waste Philippines.

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Lao  was one of five speakers during the recently concluded online panel hosted by media organization and sustainable development advocate, Eco-business, entitled “Walang Plastikan, An honest conversation on plastic packaging in the Philippines’ food industry.”

Experts said the use of plastic packaging is not something to be alarmed about, saying  plastic is proving to be valuable and critical to the  current way of life.

PARMS noted plastic helps protect food from contamination and keeps it fresher for longer. Aside from an increase of plastic packaging use for food, there is also a sharp increase in plastic medical and healthcare materials for hospitals’ use.

“If we look at waste management under the new normal, we can’t highlight enough that waste avoidance should be top priority and segregation at source is critical to any form of waste management programs,” explained Lao.

Lao also touched on ways for how industries should tackle the issue of plastic waste going forward. “We need to design packaging under the new normal focused on waste avoidance and make a decision on whether a product should be reusable, recyclable, durable, repairable, have less packaging, or even no packaging at all.”

The issue surrounding the use of single-use plastics has been in discussion for quite some time. Recycling activities however have been put on hold due to the unprecedented situation caused by the pandemic.

Edwin Seah, the head of Sustainability and Communications of Singapore-based Food Industry Asia, raised concerns against hastily and indiscriminately banning all forms of single-use plastic like those used in food packaging.

Sea said that proper food packaging protects the contents which are especially vulnerable in a climate like that of the Philippines’.

“In the Philippines, plastic waste collection is not a problem. It’s probably the highest in the region but the problem is what happens after it’s collected.”

“The problem really is in terms of the facilities of waste management,” said Toff Rada, country manager of Corporate and Government Affairs of Mondelez Philippines.

Based along Parañaque city, Mondelez Philippines works closely with the city’s local government to help improve waste collection and has already invested P2 million for the construction of a plastic waste recycling plant together with PARMS and its member companies.

“We have a PARMS pilot recycling facility that we have invested in and that we hope will be a showcase if we finally get it at full scale,” Rada said

“As a company, we are putting our stake in the cause. We have made commitments to try and reduce our carbon footprint, and we’re going to make all our packaging recyclable by 2025. And in the short term, we’ve also committed to reduce the amount of global packaging material that we use for our products by 65,000 tons by the end of this year,” he added.

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