{"id":348566,"date":"2017-08-28T06:00:46","date_gmt":"2017-08-28T06:00:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/citifmonline.com\/?p=348566"},"modified":"2017-11-10T14:46:00","modified_gmt":"2017-11-10T14:46:00","slug":"kenya-plastic-bag-ban-comes-into-force-after-years-of-delays","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/?p=348566","title":{"rendered":"Kenya plastic bag ban comes into force after years of delays"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"story-body__introduction\">A ban on plastic carrier bags has come into force in Kenya, which means that from Monday anyone found selling, manufacturing or carrying them could face fines of up to $38,000 or prison sentences of up to four years.<\/p>\n<p>The government says the ban will help protect the environment.<\/p>\n<p>But manufacturers of the bags have argued that 80,000 jobs could be lost.<\/p>\n<p>A court on Friday rejected a challenge to the ban. Kenyans are estimated to use 24 million bags a month.<\/p>\n<p>A number of other African countries have outlawed plastic carrier bags, including South Africa, Rwanda and Eritrea.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"media-landscape has-caption full-width\"><span class=\"image-and-copyright-container\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"responsive-image__img js-image-replace\" src=\"https:\/\/ichef.bbci.co.uk\/news\/624\/cpsprodpb\/24AA\/production\/_97568390_gettyimages-451135912.jpg\" alt=\"A woman sorts out used plastic bags for re-use at the shores of a river in Nairobi (24 June 2014)\" width=\"976\" height=\"549\" data-highest-encountered-width=\"624\" \/><\/span><\/figure>\n<p>This is the third attempt in the past 10 years to ban plastic bags in Kenya.<\/p>\n<p>The BBC&#8217;s Anne Soy in Nairobi says that so far many Kenyans appear to support the ban.<\/p>\n<p>But there is also some uncertainty about how consumers will adjust to life without polythene bags, which are usually given free-of-charge at retail outlets.<\/p>\n<p>Travellers coming into Kenya with duty-free plastic shop bags will be required to leave them at the airport under the new rules, the National Environmental and Management Authority has said.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"media-landscape has-caption full-width\"><span class=\"image-and-copyright-container\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"responsive-image__img js-image-replace\" src=\"https:\/\/ichef-1.bbci.co.uk\/news\/624\/cpsprodpb\/11806\/production\/_97568617_gettyimages-160867248.jpg\" alt=\"A UN representative picks out polythene bags from a dump site near the Old Town of Mombasa (05 February 2013)\" width=\"976\" height=\"549\" data-highest-encountered-width=\"624\" \/><\/span><\/figure>\n<p>The government gave a six-month window for adjustment which expired on Sunday night.<\/p>\n<p>Manufacturers who use polythene to wrap products are exempted from the ban.<\/p>\n<p>Most traders have been caught off-guard despite the phased introduction of the ban,\u00a0<a class=\"story-body__link-external\" href=\"https:\/\/www.standardmedia.co.ke\/article\/2001252755\/ban-on-plastic-bags-starts-amid-unpreparedness\">The Standard reported<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>A spot check carried out by the newspaper revealed that most small-scale traders in Nairobi&#8217;s Muthurwa market had not obtained alternative packaging materials.<\/p>\n<p>In its ruling last week the High Court dismissed a case filed by two plastic bags importers urging it to drop the ban. The court ruled that environmental concerns were more important than commercial interests.<\/p>\n<p>Research in Europe has shown that a paper bag must be used three times to compensate for the larger amount of carbon used in manufacturing and transporting it.<\/p>\n<p>Likewise a plastic &#8220;bag for life&#8221; must be used four times, and a cotton bag must be used 131 times.<\/p>\n<p>&#8211;<\/p>\n<p>Source: BBC<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A ban on plastic carrier bags has come into force in Kenya, which means that from Monday anyone found selling, manufacturing or carrying them could face fines of up to $38,000 or prison sentences of up to four years. The government says the ban will help protect the environment. But manufacturers of the bags have [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[107],"tags":[7744,3,592,10596],"class_list":["post-348566","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-international","tag-ban","tag-ghana-news","tag-kenya","tag-plastic-bags"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/348566","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=348566"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/348566\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=348566"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=348566"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=348566"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}