Plastic bans

Plastic bans are laws that prohibit the use of polymers manufactured from petroleum or other fossil fuels, given the pollution and threat to biodiversity that they cause.

Plastics biodegrade over a long period of time, and may not biodegrade fully (so that they are absorbed into the ecosystemic) leaving traces of microplastics, ranging from 450 years for a PET plastic bottle (type 1) to thousands "never" for polypropylene-based products, including food containers (type 5).

[4] China has a phased-in program of plastic bans from 2020 to 2025 on products from bags, to straws, to cutlery, to certain packaging, to items in hotels.

[5] As of May 2024[update], 12 states in the United States (California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Maine, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont and Washington) have banned single-use plastic bags.

[6] In Nigeria, reports shows that over 60 million plastic sachets are used and disposed daily,[1] and only about 12% is recycled.