The town of Quispamsis is proposing a plastic bag ban for local retailers.
Jim Cormier with the Retail Council of Canada says he’s not opposed to the idea.
He says successful plastic bag bans require more regional harmonization, and is urging Quispamsis to reach out to other cities in Greater Saint John.
He also notes plastic bag bans can be hard to implement on a municipal level, and would ideally like to see the province get involved.
“We need as much as a harmonized process as possible within a region. We’ve been trying to get the province of New Brunswick to take action and take the lead on this, because if you have provincial legislation, everybody is following the same rules.”
Cormier says a province wide ban would avoid a lot administrative inefficiencies.
He points to P.E.I’s recent success in imposing a province-wide plastic bag ban, and thinks that New Brunswick should follow in its footsteps.
He’s also not opposed to having the province put a fee on plastic bags, much like ones seen on plastic bottles and cans.
“We’re not opposed to these sorts of things. We do believe there are other steps that can be taken first. You can achieve a lot of these plastic reductions through voluntary agreements with retailers, memorandums of understandings where government can set targets,” he said. “A ban is further down the list for us.”
Cormier says banning plastic bags can be seen as “low-hanging fruit,” and is only a small part of a much larger issue.
“You know, you could ban all plastic bags tomorrow across Canada. It wouldn’t change the litter problem, it wouldn’t change the plastics problem. It’s a very minute amount of the overall solid waste issues municipalities are dealing with.”
