The Victorian Government’s announcement on October 18 that it will ban single-use plastic shopping bags is a welcome step towards reducing plastic pollution.
Victoria will join South Australia, ACT, Northern Territory and Tasmania, which already have similar bans in place. Queensland and WA will follow in 2018, leaving NSW as the only state to allow the bags.
A single-use plastic bag is used for just 12 minutes on average, but can take up to 1000 years to break down.
Larger pieces of plastic can be mistaken for food by marine life, which can become entangled in plastic waste, choke or even starve as plastic obstructs their stomachs.
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