Approaching Environmental Fee to Plastic Bag Waste Management in Ho Chi Minh City Supermarkets

1. Approaching Environmental Fee to Plastic Bag Waste Management in Ho Chi Minh City Supermarkets Le Nguyen Thuy Trang & Nguyen Thi Hai Yen Vietnam Nov 05, 2010

2. OUTLINE • Introduction • Study objectives • Methodology • Results • Discussion and conclusion

3. INTRODUCTION • From the early 1950s in the United States and Europe, plastic bag has used in daily life. • The number of plastic bag are used more and more increasing dramatically. • Ex: At Metro Manila in the Philippines • 1982, plastics accounted for 7.5% of the weight of solid waste generated (film plastics 5.9%, hard plastics 1.6%). • 1990, this proportion had increased to 12.4% (film plastics 11.5%, hard plastics 0.9%).

4. INTRODUCTION (cont.) • The plastic waste can stay in the environment for a considerable length of time causing all sorts of problems (Halbekath, 1989). • To manage this waste, there are many ways. However, the most popular measure is a tax on plastic bags (PlasTax ). Ex: The PlasTax in Ireland (2002), 15 cents/bag  a dramatic reduction in use by over 90%. Denmark (1994), introduced a tax on plastic bags upon the retailers and promoted using the alternatives to shoppers  a 66% drop in plastic bag use.

5. B A C D E Components of refuse bag charges in New Zealand Collection Bag production Disposal Env. fee in New Zealand GST Recycling

6. INTRODUCTION (cont.) Ho Chi Minh City The total area: 2,095 km2 More than 7.1 million in 2009 Annual rate of economic growth 2.8%

7. INTRODUCTION (cont.) Figure 1. The proportion of supermarket’s group The plastic bags are delivered free of charge to the customers about 30-50 tons of plastic bags transported to the landfill daily (Le 2008, and Pham and Huynh 2009) • There are 61 supermarkets in HCMC, they are classified into three groups based on: • The area • Numbers of selling products

8. STUDY OBJECTIVES Study objectives General objective Particular objectives Studying the status and Environmental fee to manage wasteplastic bags more effective by Government Find out the total amount of waste plastic bags Proposed environmental fee’s regulations Estimated price and cost of these recycling bags

9. Management of waste plastic bags in HCMC supermarkets Study the status and Environmental fee to manage wasteplastic bags more effective by Government Estimate treatment costs Find out the total amount of waste plastic bags at supermarkets Proposed environmental fee’s regulations METHODOLOGY Conceptual Framework

10. DESIGN RESEARCHPLAN Research scope -Ho Chi Minh City -Supermarket Data analysis Research subject - Plastic bags was given directly from supermarket Methods of data collection Amount of plastic bag waste Cost of treatment or recycling • Method of selecting and investigating data • Select supermarkets • Corporation • Area or Square • Select time (day and hour) • Select checkout randomly • Observe and count the number of plastic bags per customers • Survey form • Method of selecting and investigating data • Selected research institutions by type (treatment or recycling) • Select the basis of the scope • Interview • Questionnaire RESULT

11. Methodology Sampling sites:6 of 61 supermarkets in HCMC 2 representatives for small size markets (Group III) 2 representatives for medium size markets (Group II) 2 representatives for large size markets (Group I) • Survey time • Seven consecutive working days of a week • 14 operating hours from 8:00 am to 22:00 pm •  98 survey hours Survey cashier: different cashier for each survey hour. The cashiers surveyed located in the central or marginal existing places Counting plastic bags: Number of bags delivered to customers at a surveyed cashier were counted and recorded according to the size of bags Life cycle and recycling cost survey: 3 plastic bag production and recycling enterprises were selected to survey

12. TPBai = ∑n Nj Hob-1 * mCop * Hop * Dop-year (Equation 1) Methodology (cont.) 1.Number of plastic bags released per year per survey supermarket Notes: - TPBai: a total number of plastic bags in size ai delivered per year a selected supermarket, - n: the number of customers passing the surveyed cashier during a unit of survey time Hob, - Nj: the number of plastic bags that the customer jthgot from the cashier, - mCop: the number of operation cashiers during the survey time, - Hop: the number of opening hours, - Dop-year:the total number of opening days in a year.

13. Crycai = A + B + C Other plastic products D Purify granulars Recycling granulars Film blowing Plastic bag A Waste C Extrusion Collection, washing B Estimation method of waste volumn and production cost of plastic bags (cont.)

14. Estimation method of waste volumn and production cost of plastic bags (cont.) 2.The cost for each plastic bag Notes: - Prycai : the recycling cost of a plastic bag in size ai; - Crycai: the total cost needed to recycle or purify one kilogram of plastic bags having size ai ; - Xai: the number of bags in one kilogram of bags having size ai. Prycai = Crycai /Xai (Equation 2)

15. RESULTS Total number of bags released per survey hour

16. RESULTS (cont.) The estimation of total number of bags released per year P ≤ 0.01

17. RESULTS (cont.) Total waste volumn of plastic bags by supermarkets scale 1,949.35 tons/year Total waste volume (tons / year)

18. Crycai = A + B + C Other plastic products D Purify granulars Recycling granulars Film blowing Plastic bag A Waste C Extrusion Collection, washing B RESULTS (cont.)

19. RESULTS (cont.) The production and recycling costs based on life cycle of plastic bags Note: The presented price are included printing logo’s of supermarket and VAT.

20. RESULTS (cont.) The environmental fee estimated for each Type of plastic bags

21. RESULTS (cont.) Environment fee applied for each survey supermarkets based plastic bag life cycle study Environmental fee = 13.007 (billion VND/year)

22. RESULTS (cont.) Estimation of environment fee for 61 supermarkets in HCMC Environmental fee = 33.775 (billion VND/year)

23. DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION • Basing on the plastic bag’s life cycle, applying the environmental fee for a certain size of a plastic bag is totally possible. • If any of customer requests for the bag, he/she will pay the amount of money including the cost of the plastic bag plus the environmental fee (Crycai = A + B + C). • A scenario of the above-mentioned environmental fee for the plastic bags can be applied completely to a certain supermarket in the similar group.

24. DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION (cont.) • Certainly, the above-remarked Equation 1 and 2 can be applied to supermarkets in different sizes, together with the total number of plastic bags in one kilogram to calculate the environmental levy for plastic bag in respective sizes. • Finally, since there is no research on CO2 emissions during the process of production and transportation so far. Hence, it is necessary that the further researches about CO2 emissions need to do so that the environmental costs will be more perfect.

25. For Further Information • Le Nguyen Thuy Trang, University of Natural Science, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam thuytrang.lenguyen@gmail.com • Nguyen Thi Hai Yen, University of Natural Science, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam ngthyen@hcmuns.edu.vn