WORKING FOR SUSTAINABLE FUTURE: EU AND BULGARIAN EFFORTS TO REDUCTION OF PLASTIC BAGS USE

Abstract

Over the last decades the technological transformations have changed the daily routines of many and has allowed them do extent their worldview and the range of their dreams, expectations and aims. It has led to better healthcare and longer life expectancy. However, they also have negative effects, such as pollution, environmental issues, healthcare issues, new socio-economic challenges, new inequalities, etc. In the process of expanding scientific knowledge new negative effects have been identified. One of them is related to the use of plastic bags. It turns out that something so small that we have been accustomed to for decades turns out to have an extremely harmful effect on nature, animals and human. The new facts have amplified and have been also amplified by a transformation in the values across the societies. It seems like that the focus of the people have been shifting to more care of the environment and humans’ rights and their standard of living. Thus, new national and international policies, regarding the use of plastic were introduced over the last decades. In 2015 the European Union adopted the Plastic Bags Directive (Directive (EU) 2015/72). It responded to the high level of plastic carrier bags usage in the Union as the latter were identified as one of the “top ten littered items in Europe”. The concerns of the EU are about the identified effects of these bags on the environment as a whole and in particular on “terrestrial or marine animals”, which are in danger, when eating such material. Furthermore, the humans are also affected, because they consume some of the marine animals and in some ways microplastics. The new directive forces the Member States to take measure and reduce the usage of plastic carrier bags. In response the Bulgarian state took certain measures. Until 2016 the plastic carrier bags were free in the supermarkets in Bulgaria. Since 2016 the country has introduced an additional requirement that all plastic shopping bags up to 50 microns thick should be sold. According to the Bulgarian Ministry of Environment and Water in this way, Bulgaria has applied stricter rules than the required in the European directive, which allows each country to choose how to introduce a limit on the consumption of bags up to 50 microns. In this context, the purpose of the current study is to identify the framework of policies and measures at EU and Bulgarian level for reduction of plastic carrier bags usage. The methodology used to achieve the purpose include interpretation of the legal documents of the EU and Bulgaria as well as analysis of data from Eurostat. The results show that there is a serious involvement of EU and Bulgarian administration in the process of reduction of plastic carrier bags usage, which has some effect by now. Thus, we can conclude that the European Union and Bulgaria to some extent achieved their goal, but still have challenges in this respect. This gives ground to recommend more restrictions in the usage of plastic carrier bags, investment in innovations in packaging, creating new habits in the process of school education, etc.