In 2019, Greenpeace Taiwan conducted a study to find out just how much plastic packaging retail outlets were using. The findings were meant to discourage the use of plastics, but a follow-up study done in January this year shows that grocery stores are actually using even more plastic than before.
Rows and rows of fresh groceries...All individually packaged. It might be convenient, and it might even make products look more desirable, but that’s a whole lot of plastic.
Greenpeace Taiwan conducted a study in 2019 on how much plastic Taiwan’s retailers use to package their products. The final verdict? Too much. Cut to January 2021. Greenpeace conducts a follow-up study and finds that the use of plastic to pack fresh groceries in supermarkets has increased 4%. Over 90% of grocery store products are packed in plastic.
Greenpeace says enterprises are approaching product packaging incorrectly. Many of Taiwan’s biggest chain stores have adopted PLA plastic, which is supposedly easier to compost and recycle. However, Greenpeace says recycling PLA requires precise infrastructure and proper conditions that Taiwan just doesn’t have. You can’t just throw PLA into the dirt and expect it to degrade naturally.
In Taiwan, PLAs are just more disposable, single-use waste that sticks around for generations.