Supermarkets are being asked to cut plastic waste. What would that look like?
Supermarkets are being asked to cut plastic waste. What would that look like?
The industry's trade association, the Retail Council of Canada, said the new policy "unfortunately" targets large grocers exclusively.
"Which is impractical, as Canadian retailers lack direct control and influence over the global supply chain," said Michelle Wasylyshen, the council's national spokesperson.
Are people mad about this?
I rather my egg cartons come in recyclable cardboard than the weird ass plastic thing. Milk used to come in glass bottles. Peanut butter and jam too. Theres absolutely no fucking reason to put bananas in a plastic Ziploc bag.
Y'all want more microplastics?
Completely forgot that you guys have literal milk bags. lol
I don't think I've ever seen an egg carton that isn't out of recycled paper though. For glass stuff there's at least an argument to be made about weight, but in regards to drinking water it should ideally be unnecessary anyway through clean tap water.Milk is generally better off in plastic than glass for emissions reasons, unfortunately. Glass is too heavy
Avalon Dairy in BC uses glass bottles, and grocery stores which sell them take them (in exchange for your $1 deposit) and send the bottles straight back to Avalon. They get cleaned and reused directly. If you're at the store, you can look closely at all the bottles and find the dates they were first used. Alas, I've kind of gone off getting them now that we're using 2L bottles of milk every week - the bigger bottles are extra bulky and my nearest grocery store doesn't sell Avalon.
I'm still a big fan, though. It's a good system, it genuinely causes the bottles to be reused (instead of just not made out of plastic, or "recycled"), and it's so simple. We could easily have this for everything if we regulated (or at least incentivized) specific containers for groceries, at least for things packaged domestically. No more needlessly complicated special jars for different brands of maple syrup. If every company used the same containers, when they reach the recycling depot (hopefully intact, although that's another problem) we could actually do something sensible with the things.
Milk used to come in glass bottles
I don't want more glass (deposit and all) unless they go back to milkmen delivering it and taking away the empties. And even then, that wouldn't work because of the delivery costs.
I have so much glass I have to take to the recycling depot and it's not worth your time and gasoline to do it.
... Canadian retailers lack direct control and influence over the global supply chain...
I'm going to call BS on that one. Some of the largest retailers own many parts of the supply chain and exercise monopsony power over many other parts.
Ikr, like you're telling me loblaws owned Zehrs cant cut down on their presidents choice (Loblaw) brand products shipped by loblaws transportation and logistics? They really have no control over that?
They have downstream control, but not upstream control. It is the upstream that is demanding plastic packaging here, particularly plastics which have transparency. For some reason they want to be able to see the food before buying it.
Supermarket chains have plenty of control and influence over their supply chain.
Michelle, my friend, rethink your career as a corporate cockglober.
Nobody with a drop of knowledge of how this world works would buy this bs.
Don't you see that all these companies will totally just decide to not sell to a huge market because of this law! /s
Supermarket chains have plenty of control and influence over their supply chain.
Absolutely. The customer holds all the cards. But, likewise, the supermarket chains are beholden to their customers, and those customers have shown a clear preference towards the use of plastics. How do you convince them to change?
Vote with your bulging wallets.
You're the ones who choose what products you put on your store shelves.
How do you vote for a non-existent option with your wallet?
You can't and that's why it's a shit arguement
Re-reas what I wrote.
I was addressing g my comment to the companies - they're the ones with the fat wallets, they can choose what to put on their shelves.
You should clarify that you're talking about the retailers, not the consumers. It took me a couple tries to get it and I don't think any of the other commenters did.
I was hoping it was clear that I was addressing my comments to the people who choose what to put on store shelves.
Or maybe we could just expect better out of companies without them needing a profit motive just to do the right thing.
Crazy idea, expecting people to do the right thing without being paid for it.
Not really as a lot of stores don't have equally-priced options. Packaged produce is often much cheaper than loose and prices being what they are, many of us have to choose the cheaper option.
The gov't is supposed to be here to protect us, not the businesses that force us to buy what they offer.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
Ottawa announced earlier this month that it's introducing a policy to require Canada's largest supermarket chains to develop and roll out plans to cut their plastic waste footprint.
Some major grocery chains have started moving away from these forms of plastic packaging already by choosing alternatives like glass jars, which can be returned, cleaned and refilled.
In response, businesses could pivot to a bring-your-own-container model, or offer shoppers products in plastic or glass packaging that, once emptied and cleaned, could be returned for reuse.
The government is introducing these measures through what it calls a P2 notice requiring major grocery chains to develop plans to reduce plastic waste and report publicly on their progress.
"Which is impractical, as Canadian retailers lack direct control and influence over the global supply chain," said Michelle Wasylyshen, the council's national spokesperson.
"In the meantime, we continue to encourage the government to invest in innovation and foster collaboration with all stakeholders to meet our plastic waste reduction objectives," she said.
The original article contains 1,118 words, the summary contains 156 words. Saved 86%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!
Seriously. The amount of foam trays and plastic containers used is insane, and entirely because it would cost more to develop a biodegradable alternative than to accept a bad look and just say it's for the consumer's bottom line.
While I admit that some things are done better in traditional plastic until we can create decent and cheap bioplastics (we're getting close for low strength, though I don't know if transparency is good or not), many things can just be swapped with waxed paper or cardboard. We've been using waxed paper for cup for decades now, just adapt that for other uses.
I agree it's not the supermarkets' fault but it's an industry problem. Why is everything wrapped in plastic? Even bananas and cucumbers and things that don't need plastic?
One thing we could do is have refillable containers and just reuse them! Why are bulk aisles just a thing for nuts and grains? Why can't we come and fill up milk or shampoo or other things in our refillables?
Anyway, the bigger story is that there are too many humans. We don't have a plastics problem, we have a human overpopulation problem.
Even bananas and cucumbers and things that don’t need plastic?
Cucumbers, like many other foods, are wrapped in plastic because they last longer that way. Less spoilage comes with many obvious benefits, like not needing to produce/transport as many, which reduces greenhouse gas emissions. Of course, nothing in life comes free of tradeoffs. Pick your poison.
I don't think I've ever seen a plastic wrapped banana in the store, but it is documented that wrapping bananas in plastic also slows their rate of decay, so no doubt the calculus leans towards plastic in some situations as well.
“Which is impractical, as Canadian retailers lack direct control and influence over the global supply chain,” said Michelle Wasylyshen, the council’s national spokesperson.
See, this wouldn't be a problem with EPR. Grocers could still buy plastic-wrapped avocados from Mexico or whatever, if there were no other options, because the extra cost to cover disposal wouldn't be prohibitive without any competition. That's not the approach they're going with, though, so they're probably going to have to carve in a lot of exceptions.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extended_producer_responsibility for those wondering.
Ah yes, sorry. I've mentioned it a few times on here, so I didn't want to link it again unless asked.
Our gov'ts have decided that big business is more important than the citzens who elected them.
I have no idea how to change that. :/
We can vote, or even take on extra activism, which could even be as simple as a lawn sign. I'm not sure a lack of valuing citizens is the problem in this specific case but that applies as much as ever.
"All garbage truck drivers should be banned from dumping plastic in the dump!"
"All supermarket should sell a thicker plastic in place of thin plastic bags and call it reusable!"
"All candy company should sell two candy in one package for the environment conscious consumers with a tag line 'slash your candy wrapper use in half'"
- Department of corporate blame redirection /s