One of the main items in your household waste wheelie bins used may be plastic bags or film. This should now be a thing of the past.
Ideally, we should all try to buy items without plastic packaging, but some items need plastic packaging to preserve them or for hygienic reasons. Many supermarkets are reducing the use of single use plastic, and packaging, and some local stores, such as, Swains Farm shop use very little for fruit and veg.
We currently have 2 types of plastic bags:
- Plant-based biodegradable bags which should continue to go into your household waste bins, or into a compost bin/heap. eg some magazine wrappers or carrier bags.
- All other soft plastic – frozen fruit and veg packaging, dry cooking goods eg rice, dried fruit, coffee bags, granola and other plastic cereal packets, bubble wrap, cellophane bags, film lids, cling film, carrier bags, pet food pouches, etc, can now be recycled.
Soft plastic is now seen as a valuable recycling resource because in April 2022 a plastic tax was introduced on soft plastic packaging for large manufacturers/importers that does not contain at least 30% recyclable plastic.
This is the start of the ‘circular economy’ for soft plastic, so it doesn’t end up damaging our environment.
So please separate out all your plastic packaging from your other household rubbish and take it to one of your local stores:
Henfield Sainsbury’s now takes soft plastic, just hand to a staff member, Tesco’s, other Sainsburys, Co-op stores (locally these include: Partridge Green, Cowfold and Steyning)
