Spar EC goes big in the battle to beat the plastic bag

Finally, a leading Eastern Cape retailer has grabbed the issue of the infestation of the province with plastic shopping bags, and has swung over to the green side.

In a major announcement last night, which will have important and positive impacts on landfill sites, wildlife, and people’s money, Spar Eastern Cape managing director Conrad Isaac announced that the brand’s 243 stores will be introducing tough paper and fabric bags in all its stores.

The paper bags cost R1.90, but this weekend shoppers will be given a free paper shopping bag, if they bring any 10 plastic bags to the store in order to get a paper bag.

  The campaign, “Stop the use of plastic”, will have a number of side projects, but in the main, Spar EC made a public announcement across the media, that they intend to stop selling 101-million plastic shopping bags every year — which end up “in the street, in the veld, floating in a river or in the sea and endangering our natural resources”.

Instead there will be a range of alternatives from long-life bags, and recyclable bags on offer, he said.

Calling Spar “the biggest retailer in the region”, Isaac said a task of this magnitude would require changing the “ingrained habit of using plastic shopping bags”.

But he said: “It will have to change." ­