France is the first European Member State to have developed a strategy to solve the problem of single-use plastics. EU lawmakers have agreed on a ban on single-use plastic products, the Austrian presidency said in Brussels on Wednesday. For other plastic products, such as food containers, cups and lids, the focus will be on limiting their use and, in some cases, on setting cleaning obligations for manufacturers. The Single-Use Plastics Directive will ban products for which there are alternatives on the market, such as plastic coating, plates and oxodegradable plastic items, by 2021. EU member states must also meet a target of 90% collection for plastic bottles by 2029. The Netherlands has taken a very laudable step by extending the existing deposit system for plastic bottles to bottles of less than one litre. The collection system includes a separate collection target of 90% for PET bottles and goes beyond the minimum requirements of the EU directive, increasing the deadline to 2022 instead of 2029. However, as required by EU legislation, the single-use plastic challenge should be addressed comprehensively. Environmental and marine NGOs have therefore called on the government to take a more holistic approach to single-use plastics and to extend the bans to other single-use plastic products (such as wipes, tea bags, confetti, balloons or pieces of plastic in fireworks). In addition, NGOs also called for earlier implementation of producer liability measures and the introduction of labelling rules for more single-use plastic products to raise consumer awareness. At the Strasbourg session, 560 MEPs voted in favour of the most recent agreement with EU ministers and 35 voted against, with 28 abstentions.

The directive must only go through formal formalities before being published in EU rules. Once this is done, EU Member States have two years to implement the directive. UK Environment Minister Michael Gove, who has already argued with the European Commission over who is doing the most to reduce plastic pollution, also wants to curb single-use plastics. Balloons, cotton swabs, plastic bags, they are products harmful to the environment without which we could live.