JAKARTA– Hundreds of environmentalists sent an open letter to leaders of e-commerce and marketplace companies, to realise a single-use plastic-free lifestyle, amid the increasing frequency of online shopping, during the COVID-19 pandemic, activists said yesterday.
In their 2021 Plastic-Free Parade, they asked online shopping companies to provide consumers with choices to minimise single-use plastic and set environmentally friendly shipping alternatives.
Tiza Mafira, activist from Indonesia Plastic Bag Diet Movement, said, this option is one solution to reduce negative impact of accumulating plastic waste on the environment. So far there have been several e-commerce entities that provide “no plastic” or “packaging returns” options on their checkout page, but they are only a few.
“Imagine if all e-commerce companies provided options like this to their consumers, surely the positive impact on the environment would be felt,” Mafira said.
According to research by the Indonesian Institute of Sciences (LIPI) last year, plastic waste from online shopping increased to 96 percent, during the COVID-19 pandemic, in line with the rising transactions on the marketplace to 62 percent and food delivery service to 47 percent.
Meanwhile, a Greenpeace Indonesia study in a report titled “Earth without Plastic,” concluded that, 75 percent of the total 623 respondents agreed to reduce or even stop the use of single-use plastic for packaging, and only 20 percent considered single-use plastic packaging harmless.
So far, the obligation to arrange a waste reduction roadmap only applies to producing companies, but not to those selling their products by e-commerce system on marketplaces.
As of Jun, 2021, only 23 producers have submitted their waste reduction roadmap plans to the Environment and Forestry Ministry.
The activists also asked e-commerce and marketplace entities to provide trainings for their delivery service partners, on how to package goods in a way to minimise single-use plastic.
Source: NAM NEWS NETWORK
