Image: Brian Yurasits via Unsplash
On 1 November, Sweden abolished a tax that had cut plastic bag consumption by more than 75% over the past four years, despite warnings that this step could cause usage to return to previous levels, reported The Guardian.
Since Sweden introduced a 3-kroner (USD 0.28) tax on plastic bags in May 2020, the country has seen a dramatic drop in their usage. In 2019, before the levy was implemented, the average Swede used 74 plastic bags per year. By 2023, this number had plummeted to just 17 bags per person annually.
Sweden enacted the law in response to the European Union’s 2015 plastic bag directive, which mandated that member states dramatically reduce their usage.
Last year, Sweden’s government announced plans to abolish the plastic bag tax, explaining that the nation’s consumption had already fallen below the European Union’s target levels. They stated that, given this achievement, the levy was “not deemed necessary for its purpose”.
Although Sweden was instrumental in inventing the plastic bag—patented by the Swedish company Celloplast in 1965 and rapidly replacing cloth and paper bags across Europe—the country has become a leader in efforts to reduce plastic bag usage.
For many years, leading supermarkets have charged fees for plastic and paper bags, prompting customers to bring their own reusable bags. Meanwhile, the introduction of the tax rapidly decreased bag consumption in other areas of the retail sector.
Joakim Brodahl, from the non-profit organization Keep Sweden Clean, warned that abolishing the tax would likely reduce the cost of plastic bags for consumers, leading to increased usage: “We see that there is a risk that the behaviour can quickly turn back unless, for example, the trade is alert to changes in their sales of plastic bags.”
