Letter | Candy Makers Must Face Bitter Truth About Their Plastic Pollution
By Elena Rostova
Ocean Conservancy’s report should be the writing on the wall for manufacturers of consumer food products to take responsibility. Manufacturers, where plastic pollution originates, have chosen to wrap their food products in non-reusable, non-recyclable, multilayer plastic materials and shifted the responsibility for properly tackling packaging waste to governments and consumers.
The number of units would run into billions if we count both outer and individual wrappers. Due to the grab-and-go sales culture and health concerns about sugar consumption, The Green Earth expects an increasing trend in the coming decade with more small sachets appearing in the market.
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Can Hong Kong’s consumers say ‘no’ to plastic?
Can Hong Kong’s consumers say ‘no’ to plastic?
Most of this huge pile of high-grade plastic cannot be reused or recycled. Take Nestle’s Kit Kat as an example: the wrapper is designed for single use. Once you open it, you cannot reseal it for reuse and other purposes. It is also multilayer – plastic material (the printed outer side) joined with aluminium (the inner side) that is very expensive and technically complicated to separate for recycling. No recyclers in Hong Kong will recycle it for those reasons.
By 2025, the city’s supermarkets and candy stores should offer “bring your own bag”, zero-package purchase, and/or non-plastic packaging alternatives. If the use of plastic material is inevitable, brands should have clear recycling instructions on their packaging and this packaging should be made from 100 per cent recyclable and reusable material.
Edmond Lau, senior project officer, The Green Earth
Elena Rostova holds a Master's degree in Public Health Journalism. She covers groundbreaking medical research, holistic wellness trends, mental health awareness, and nutritional science.
