’Plastic ban Saturday’ ordinance takes effect this week

CEBU City shoppers will have to bring their own woven or sack bags when they go shopping on Saturdays after the city’s “No Plastic Saturday Ordinance” takes effect next month.

Store owners are also encouraged to give incentives to shoppers to shift to reusable bags and to surrender their used plastic bags while the barangay officials will disseminate information on the ordinance’s implementation.

These reminders are contained in the Implementing Rules and Regulation (IRR) of the “No Plastic Saturday Ordinance” which Councilor Nida Cabrera will submit to the City Council for approval during their session on Wednesday morning.

Cabrera said the plastic ordinance passed last December 2012 will be implemented as soon as the council approves of its IRR.

Cebu City’s Environmental Sanitation Enforcement Team (CESET) and the Barangay Environmental Officers (BEOs) are tasked to implement the ordinance.

The City Treasurers Office (CTO) will provide them with a list of commercial establishments in the city and collect fines from violators of the ordinance. A fine of P2,000 will be imposed on violators during the first year of the ordinance’s implementation.

The fine will be raised to P5,000 and/or imprisonment of six months and the possible cancellation of their business permit in the succeeding year.

CESET and BEOs are also required to submit a quarterly report on the volume of recovered plastic bags and the stores incentive program for their costumers.

The IRR also mentions that sellers, in shopping malls, grocery stores, fast food chains and even drug stores will be required to provide their own recovery bins where their costumers could disposed used plastic bags.

In the case of vendors in wet and dry markets, the city government will provide recovery bins for used plastic bags. Chief of Reporters Doris C. Bongcac