Welcome to the Plastics Weekly, NEO’s regular news monitoring of the plastics industry.
This week’s highlights:
- Anti-waste researchers are urging retailers to stop making everyday products such as drinks bottles, outdoor furniture and toys out of brightly coloured plastic, which was found to degrade into microplastics faster than plainer colours. Red, blue and green plastic became “very brittle and fragmented”, while black, white and silver samples were “largely unaffected” over a three-year period, according to a study led by the University of Leicester. (The Guardian)
- The Philippines is turning the tide on pollution: the country is taking bold steps to tackle this crisis after long being one of the biggest producers of oceanic plastic waste. Over the last year, Manila has rolled out one of the world’s most ambitious laws on extended producer responsibility (EPR), which hold manufacturers accountable for managing waste resulting from their products and encourage a circular economy. EPR laws are a key topic of discussion among negotiators working on the UN plastics treaty. (Nikkei Asia)
- The push to control plastic waste in New York is gaining momentum as city and state leaders are backing state legislation to curb it. In 2020, New York banned the plastic supermarket bag. Many more single-use plastic products could face similar bans if state lawmakers approve the Packaging Reduction and Recycling Infrastructure Act in early June. (The New York Times)