Over recent years, Da Nang’s Co.op Mart and BigC Mall have been actively encouraging their customers to use eco-friendly shopping bags by presenting them with free reusable cloth shopping bags.

In the fact, the city’s residents prefer to keep using the traditional plastic bags rather than reusable bags when they do their shopping.  Some cashiers at the Co.op Mart said that many customers do not want to buy extra cloth reusable bags despite their cheap price of only 10,000 VND each.  Most local shoppers think that there is no need to waste their money on buying reusable bags.

The impact of plastic bags on the environment

According to a recent survey, the purchase of plastic bags by local market traders is very popular due to their very cheap price and convenience.  Although the wholesale price of a kilogram of this type of bag has been increased by up to 20,000 VND as prescribed in the new Environmental Protection Law, the number of buyers is still high.

Some businesses from Ho Chi Minh City and Dong Nai Province introduced more eco-friendly plastic bags to small traders at local traditional markets, and they were willing to use them instead of the usual plastic ones.  However, after a short time, local traders expressed their doubts about the feasibility of the product and they no longer show any interest in this type of bag.

Da Nang’s authorities have recently asked local relevant agencies to raise public awareness about the effects of plastic bags on the environment, and to encourage local residents to use eco-friendly bags in their daily lives.  A focus will be on increasing the production of eco-friendly bags, and applying domestic waste production and recycling technologies.  Special attention will be paid to keeping a close eye on environment tax collection relating to non-degradable bags in order to ensure the efficiency of the implementation of the State’s preferential policies for using eco-friendly bags.