To curtail high plastic usage in Singapore, more than 270 food and beverage (F&B) outlets will phase out plastic straws by July 1.
This includes 53 F&B outlets owned by Accor Group, which operates hotels like Raffles, Swissotel and Fairmont, 24 Pastamania outlets, dozens of outlets operated by Wildlife Reserves Singapore and 15 eateries under the Spa Espirit Group including Tiong Bahru Bakery and 40 Hands.
As part of Plastic ACTion (PACT), a World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) initiative supported by the National Environment Agency (NEA) and Zero Waste SG, the F&B outlets will remove straws completely from their premises or provide them only on request.
“This is a great example of voluntary action by businesses, and while we work with the group on next steps, we encourage more brands to join the effort,” said Kim Stengert, Chief, Strategic Communication and External Relations, WWF-Singapore.
According to a 2018 report by AlphaBeta, people in Singapore use about 2.2 million straws daily.
“Straws are a starting point in the move to reducing overall use of plastics by businesses. WWF and Zero Waste SG will continue to work with the F&B industry to reduce unnecessary plastics such as stirrers, cutlery and plastic bottles while working on measures and innovations to tackle the plastic problem,” said WWF in the release.
Singapore uses about 1.76 billion plastic items each year. This includes 820 million plastic bags from supermarkets, 467 million PET bottles and 473 million plastic disposable items. The statistics are based on Singapore Environment Council’s position paper published in 2018.