"It is recommended to increase subsidies for degradable plastic products", "Strictly enforce the law and formulate severe punishment measures", "The effectiveness of plastic restriction needs to be improved, and companies selling plastic bags, supermarkets and takeaway shops have made money"... Last month, this edition published a series of reports focusing on the ten-year plastic restriction, which triggered widespread discussion. More than a thousand readers left messages on the client of this newspaper and put forward relevant opinions and suggestions.

The plastic restriction order was implemented in June 2008. The achievements in the past 10 years are obvious to all, but the expectations of the people are higher requirements for future work. In response to the issues that readers reflected more concentratedly, this newspaper reporter interviewed relevant persons in charge of the Ministry of Commerce, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment and other departments.

Ministry of Commerce: Some fields and enterprises use excessively, and the industry standard of e-commerce green packaging technology management will be released

In recent years, some fields and enterprises have used excessive plastic packaging, and the problem of white pollution has been on the rise. Since the implementation of the plastic restriction order, it has played a certain positive role in reducing the use of plastic bags in commodity retail places, but there are still problems. The Ministry of Commerce attaches great importance to the prevention and control of plastic packaging pollution and cooperates with the National Development and Reform Commission and other departments to increase implementation efforts.

Many readers reported that "at the vegetable stalls in the supermarket, one garlic is packed in one bag, and you can't buy vegetables without five or six bags."... In the past 10 years, many large shopping malls have begun to open large supermarkets of chain brands, and more and more consumers buy the goods they need for food, clothing, housing and transportation in shopping malls. How to solve the problem of excessive use of plastic packaging?

It is reported that the Ministry of Commerce is carrying out the creation of green shopping malls, and has created 85 green shopping malls covering all provinces in China to promote the green development of the circulation industry, including plastic restriction. This year, the Ministry of Commerce has formulated the "Green Shopping Mall (Supermarket) Creation and Implementation Evaluation Rules", which takes several specific requirements for plastic reduction as key indicators to guide circulation enterprises to actively reduce plastic. At present, various places are actively applying. During the China Energy Conservation Promotion Week recently, many green shopping malls in China carried out theme activities such as "Stop Providing Plastic Bags for One Hour" and played energy-saving propaganda films, achieving good social benefits.

At present, in some new circulation fields such as express delivery, plastic bags are used more, and white pollution is becoming more prominent. What progress has been made in accelerating the standardization process of green packaging?

The person in charge of the Circulation Development Department of the Ministry of Commerce introduced that, on the one hand, the Ministry of Commerce and the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology jointly issued the Guiding Opinions on Accelerating the Transformation and Development of China's Packaging Industry, and clearly promoted the simplification, reduction, reuse and refinement of packaging design technology. The relevant associations were jointly compiled and issued the Green Development Guidelines for Warehousing, Distribution and Packaging, encouraging e-commerce companies to cooperate with suppliers, make full use of original packaging, reduce secondary packaging waste, encourage the merger of customer orders, and reduce the number of packages and delivery times. On the other hand, the industry standards for green packaging technology and management specifications for e-commerce will be formulated and released in the near future.

Ministry of Ecology and Environment: Centralize the rectification of waste plastic processing and utilization distribution centers, and increase environmental supervision of the recycling process

Some readers said that in addition to plastic bags, a large amount of disposable bowls, chopsticks, paper cups and other plastic products have been discarded, which has caused water and soil pollution. The plastic restriction order proposes that the environmental protection department should increase environmental supervision of the recycling process of waste plastics, formulate environmental access conditions, pollution control standards and technical specifications and supervise their implementation, and establish an environmental management system for the entire process of waste plastics. How is the implementation effect of the environmental protection department?

A relevant person in charge of the Ministry of Ecology and Environment said that the environmental protection department has issued a number of normative documents alone or in conjunction with relevant departments to centrally rectify the waste plastic processing and utilization distribution centers and waste plastic processing and utilization enterprises, and promote the concentrated development and clean utilization of waste plastic recycling. In 2017, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment jointly carried out the cleanup and rectification of the "five wastes" recycling and utilization industries such as waste plastics with relevant departments. At present, China has focused on rectifying 194 "five wastes" industry distribution centers, investigated 18,000 recycling and utilization enterprises, and closed down and abolished more than 8,800.

"In the next step, we will continue to strengthen law enforcement supervision, continue to clean up and rectify with relevant departments, and resolutely ban small workshops, "scattered and dirty" enterprises and distribution centers for the processing and utilization of waste such as waste plastics that are seriously polluted and strongly complained by the masses." The person in charge said.

China is the world's largest producer and consumer of plastic products. In 2017, the total output of China's plastic products industry was 75.1554 million tons. Plastics such as lunch boxes face the problem of difficulty in recycling. In practice, the Ministry of Commerce and the National Development and Reform Commission are responsible for the relevant work of China's waste plastic recycling system.

"In recent years, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment has carried out special inspections on imported waste plastics together with the General Administration of Customs, and severely cracked down on illegal processing of imported waste plastics and other illegal and criminal acts. Regulations on the prevention and control of pollution in the processing and utilization of waste plastics have been formulated, and small-scale and low-management processing and utilization enterprises have been eliminated, which has improved the scale and intensiveness of the industry." The person in charge said.

Other departments: Strengthen market supervision and establish a long-term mechanism for supervision and inspection of excessive packaging and plastic restriction orders

The plastic restriction order requires that the industrial and commercial departments should strengthen the supervision and inspection of the sale and use of plastic shopping bags in supermarkets, shopping malls, collective markets and other commodity retail places, and investigate and deal with the illegal continued sale and use of ultra-thin plastic shopping bags in accordance with laws and regulations. However, in some areas, collective markets and farmers' markets still have the phenomenon of illegal sales and use of plastic shopping bags. In recent years, the national market supervision department has concentrated on carrying out plastic restriction rectification actions in collective trade and farmers' markets, and proposed to clarify responsibilities, strengthen the responsibilities of market operators, give full play to the market supervision function, and strictly enforce the law to promote implementation.

The plastic restriction order also proposed that the quality inspection department should establish a product quality supervision mechanism for plastic shopping bag manufacturers, and impose corresponding penalties in accordance with laws and regulations for illegal and irregular behaviors, improve quality supervision measures, increase law enforcement efforts, and strictly implement exposure, recall, rectification, and punishment systems. In recent years, a number of standards such as "General Technical Requirements for Environmental Protection, Safety, and Labeling of Plastic Shopping Bags", "Plastic Shopping Bags", and "Biodegradable Plastic Garbage Bags" have been successively issued, and the standardization of biodegradable plastic bags for plastic shopping bag substitutes has been carried out in an orderly manner.

Previously, the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress of China conducted a special inquiry on the implementation of the Solid Waste Law. A relevant person in charge of the National Development and Reform Commission said that China has implemented a plastic restriction order, investigated and dealt with illegal cases of plastic restriction and excessive packaging through joint law enforcement, and strengthened the management of packaging waste in emerging fields such as e-commerce and express delivery.

The National Development and Reform Commission is preparing to work with relevant departments to study and adjust the plastic restriction order, and to develop relevant implementation plans to take the lead in restricting the use of a series of non-degradable plastic packaging in e-commerce, express delivery, takeout and other industries, and urge local governments, especially cities, to increase their efforts to implement it. Through law enforcement inspections and publicity guidance, we will further establish a long-term mechanism to restrict excessive packaging and supervise and inspect the plastic restriction order, and guide consumers to consume in a civilized and green manner. Relevant departments will also promote new materials that are more environmentally friendly.

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