The "plastic ban" has been implemented for 11 years. While supermarkets and shopping malls charge for the use of plastic shopping bags, the rapidly developing online e-commerce sector seems to have become a blank area for the "plastic ban". Most e-commerce companies provide free plastic bags by default, and consumers have no choice but to use plastic bags. The waste of plastic bags is very common.

Last week, a survey conducted by the Social Survey Center of China Youth Daily on wenjuan.com on 2,005 respondents showed that 86.6% of the respondents felt that there was a waste of plastic bags in the e-commerce sector. 53% of the respondents said they were willing to pay a certain fee for e-commerce companies to use reusable and environmentally friendly packaging.

86.6% of the respondents felt that there was a waste of plastic bags in the e-commerce sector

24-year-old Ye Zi (pseudonym) is studying for a master's degree in Beijing. Online shopping is a common thing for her in her daily life. She basically buys books, daily necessities, cosmetics and electronic products online every week. "I also like handmade products and buy a lot of handmade products."

"I feel that there are a lot of free plastic bags when shopping online. Many products are wrapped in many layers of plastic bags. For example, for handmade products, each small material is packaged in a separate plastic bag." Ye Zi feels that there are many cases of wasting plastic bags when shopping online. "The plastic bag has three layers inside and three layers outside. Some packaging is really unnecessary."

Beijing office worker Liu Xue (pseudonym) orders takeout almost every day at noon. "I don't have time to eat in the store at noon. There are too many people and it's crowded. It takes a long time to queue up." Liu Xue feels that it is very common to pack takeout in plastic bags and plastic boxes. "Some will use several layers of plastic bags. If there is soup, it will be packed in a separate bag. Sometimes, three or four plastic bags will be used for a meal at noon."

In the survey, 69.2% of the respondents shop online more than once a week. 63.7% of the respondents felt that they used a lot of free plastic bags when shopping online, and 11.2% of the respondents felt that they used a lot.

22-year-old Ji Xingchen (pseudonym) is a college student. Although she doesn't shop online much, she will stock up a lot of things every time she shops online. "I shop online once or twice a month, mainly for clothes and cosmetics. Every time I buy a big bag of clothes, they are all packed in plastic bags. When I open the express delivery, the bags are often damaged, so they can't be used again and can only be thrown away."

After receiving the items purchased online, Ye Zi usually distinguishes whether the plastic bags and packaging can be reused. "For example, I often have some garbage when I do handicrafts, so I will use some plastic bags to pack the garbage, and some bags are thrown away directly."

For the plastic bags of online shopping items, 60.1% of the respondents will reuse them, and 37.7% of the respondents will throw them away.

"At lunch time, there are often a lot of takeout bags piled up next to the company's trash cans." Liu Xue said that after eating takeout, she sometimes keeps the outermost plastic bag to pack garbage, but some thinner bags are usually thrown away. Some bags are stained by food or oil stains and cannot be reused.

Ji Xingchen said that when shopping for cosmetics online, he did encounter the phenomenon of excessive packaging, "Many cosmetics are already packaged very thickly, there is no need to put so many bags on the outside."

In the survey, 86.6% of the respondents felt that there was a waste of plastic bags in the e-commerce field, of which 27.5% felt that it was very common.

Xiao Wang, who is in charge of the delivery business at a courier service center of a university in Beijing, found that some students had already packed their parcels when they sent them, but suddenly decided to pack more things, so the previous bags had to be discarded and replaced with new ones, "about ten bags would be wasted in a day."

"There are more girls in the school, and they often send clothes. Generally, bags are used for less than 3 kilograms. There are courier recycling baskets in the school. Some good bags can be reused, but most of them may be thrown away directly." Courier Xiao Wang said.

90.6% of the respondents believe that it is necessary to solve the problem of plastic bag waste in the e-commerce field

"I think the use of plastic bags in the e-commerce field lacks regulations. When you go to the supermarket to buy things, many plastic bags are provided for a fee, but there is no standard in the e-commerce field." Ye Zi feels that sometimes consumers are very concerned about the integrity of the packaging of items when shopping online. In order to reduce the problems caused by packaging damage and reduce unnecessary losses, merchants will use some cheap plastic bags for more protection, which causes waste.

As for the problem of plastic bag waste when shopping online, 66.5% of the respondents feel that plastic bags are provided free of charge when shopping online, and consumers have no other choice; 56.5% of the respondents pointed out that the "plastic restriction order" has a blind spot in the e-commerce field. 39.8% of the respondents believe that some plastic bags are low-cost and do not feel wasteful; and 22.5% of the respondents believe that it is more convenient to use plastic bags.

Liu Jianguo, a professor at the Institute of Solid Waste Control and Resource Utilization, School of Environment, Tsinghua University, believes that the main reason for the excessive use of plastic bags and plastic packaging in the field of online shopping and express delivery is the externalization of costs, and neither the platform merchants nor the consumers have taken responsibility. "The "Plastic Restriction Order" was officially implemented in 2008. Today, the total economic volume and consumption scale are incomparable. In particular, with the sudden rise of e-commerce, the use of plastic bags has increased rapidly. Therefore, the "Plastic Restriction Order" needs to keep pace with the times and upgrade. The National Development and Reform Commission has carried out preliminary work in this regard and widely solicited opinions from the society. It is inevitable that the upgraded version of the "Plastic Restriction Order" will focus on emerging industries such as e-commerce that use a large amount of plastic products, and will definitely put forward requirements such as restrictions, regulations and substitutions. In fact, the legislation on garbage classification issued by various cities such as Beijing and Shanghai all have requirements for the promotion of green packaging in industries such as online shopping, express delivery and takeout."

Ye Zi believes that it is very necessary to solve the problem of plastic bag waste in the field of e-commerce. "Previous regulations focused more on offline shopping, but now that e-commerce is developing rapidly, there needs to be awareness of the reasonable use of plastic packaging, and there also needs to be a clear environmental protection standard."

Data shows that 90.6% of respondents believe that it is necessary to solve the problem of plastic bag waste in the e-commerce field, of which 28.3% of respondents believe that it is very necessary.

"Yesterday I saw the news that Beijing will implement the domestic waste management regulations, which mentioned that take-outs cannot actively provide disposable chopsticks and must use environmentally friendly packaging materials. I think the problem of plastic bags also needs to be taken seriously to reduce dependence on plastic bags." Liu Xue said.

53% of respondents are willing to pay a certain fee for e-commerce to use reusable environmentally friendly packaging

Liu Xue believes that e-commerce platforms need to give consumers a choice. "I buy vegetables and fresh food in online supermarkets on weekends. Almost every time they are delivered in a big bag. It is enough to stock up one or two for reuse at home, and the others are not used. I hope that when placing an order, I can choose not to use bags, use unified express boxes for delivery, or use plastic bags for a fee like supermarkets."

In the survey, 53.0% of the respondents were willing to pay a certain fee for e-commerce companies to use reusable environmentally friendly packaging, 24.4% of the respondents were unwilling, and 22.6% of the respondents said they couldn't say.

"I think there can be certain restrictions on the use of plastic bags in express packaging, and encourage the use of recyclable materials." Ye Zi thinks that consumers also need to cultivate consumption habits and reuse as much as possible.

Liu Xue thinks that you can try to use some environmentally friendly bags or degradable lunch boxes. "The platform cooperates with merchants, and merchants who use environmentally friendly lunch boxes and packaging can have special logos. I am definitely willing to choose merchants with environmentally friendly logos."

To reduce the abuse of plastic bags in the e-commerce field, in the survey, 59.6% of the respondents suggested giving consumers more choices for item packaging and not providing plastic bags by default; 58.7% of the respondents suggested promoting "shared" environmentally friendly boxes, which can be recycled after delivery; 56.7% of the respondents suggested that e-commerce platforms simplify product packaging and reduce the excessive use of plastic bags. Other suggestions include: research and develop more recyclable packaging products to replace plastic bags (38.9%); refine the "plastic ban" in the e-commerce field, clarify industry norms (36.3%) and encourage consumers to develop green online shopping habits (24.5%).

Zhu Fenfen, associate professor at the School of Environment of Renmin University of China, said that from the perspective of cost, plastic bags, as the cheapest and most space-saving packaging containers that reduce freight costs, will be adopted by express delivery companies. From the perspective of the plastic processing process, if the incineration facilities operate normally and are equipped with qualified flue gas treatment devices, dioxin pollution is controllable. "Although theoretically, pollution in the plastic processing process is controllable, we should not encourage everyone to use plastic bags vigorously, but use and limit them rationally." Zhu Fenfen believes that e-commerce packaging can be required to be made of recycled plastics, and new plastic bags made directly from chemical plants cannot be used. "It is best that e-commerce packaging bags can no longer be recycled into plastic products, so that they can be collected and incinerated after being discarded and enter the global carbon cycle."

Liu Jianguo believes that reducing plastic waste in the e-commerce sector requires the online shopping, express delivery and takeaway industries to formulate packaging operation specifications, promote standardized packaging, and eliminate excessive packaging. From an institutional perspective, the extended producer responsibility system can be implemented in the online shopping, express delivery and takeaway industries, or responsibilities can be shared based on the profit ratio of merchants, platforms, and consumers to promote source reduction and increase the proportion of packaging recycling. "The cure for the stubborn problem of plastic packaging waste in the online shopping, express delivery and takeaway sectors is by no means the responsibility of any one company, nor can any one company solve it alone. It must involve all relevant parties, including government departments, industries, platforms, merchants, consumers, and social organizations, with each party taking its own responsibilities, multi-party governance, and social coordination."

Among the respondents, 1.6% were born after 2000, 30.9% were born after 1990, 49.7% were born after 1980, 13.3% were born after 1970, and 3.7% were born after 1960. 32.5% are from first-tier cities, 45.3% are from second-tier cities, 18.3% are from third- and fourth-tier cities, 3.3% are from towns or county towns, and 0.5% are from rural areas.

(China Youth Daily¡¤China Youth Network reporter Sun Shan intern Wang Ziwei)

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