Debated in Parliament on 1 Mar 2024.
Mr Louis Ng Kok Kwang asked the Minister for Sustainability and the Environment (a) whether the Ministry will consider imposing a charge for small disposable carrier bags; (b) how many companies have voluntarily introduced their own disposable bag charge; and (c) if the data is not available, whether the Ministry will start collecting the data.
Mr Speaker, the mandatory disposable carrier bag charge at larger supermarkets was implemented on 3 July 2023. My Ministry and the National Environment Agency (NEA) will monitor the effectiveness of the bag charge and review its impact upon the completion of the first full year of implementation. The charge applies to all disposable carrier bags, regardless of size.
Other retailers have the prerogative to decide whether to charge for disposable bags and many have been doing so. The Ministry of Sustainability and the Environment (MSE) and NEA do not track retailers that have voluntarily implemented disposable carrier bag charges and have no plans to do so. Nonetheless, we are heartened that many major retailers, including convenience stores, have voluntarily implemented charges.
Mr Ng.
Thank you, Sir. I thank the Senior Parliamentary Secretary for the reply. Could I just ask why are we not keen on tracking how many of these retailers are voluntarily imposing this bag charge? I think that would be useful to tell the effects of the bag charge that we have implemented on how many people out there are already doing it on their own, without the legislation.
Sir, as I have said earlier, the disposable carrier bag charge was only implemented recently, about half a year ago. So, we will continue to monitor the effectiveness, the impact and then assess whether we would like to expand the scheme.
PAPERCUTS