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Last week we told you about the Draft Environmental Protection Regulation. Well today, the Department of the Environment heard comments and answered questions from the main stakeholders who will be affected by the phase out action plan. The consultation was held at the Radisson this morning and we dropped by to find out more about the regulation and what it means for manufacturers and consumers.

Maxine Monsanto - Environmental Officer, Environmental Law and Policy Unit
"Today is a national consultation with stakeholder on the draft Environmental Protection Pollution from plastics regulation 2019. The objective today is honestly a two-way flow consultation. We have presented a summary of the draft legislation and we are obtaining feedback from the directly affected stakeholders basically importers, manufacturers, distributors some of the end users to get an idea of how we can strengthen and improve the draft legislation."

Courtney Weatherburne
"How has the discussions been going so far? What are some of the main points you guys are covering?"

Maxine Monsanto
"Well we basically gave a summary of the legislation which has 5 parts, we announced what are the proposed dates for the phase out are, that is in part 5, in miscellaneous and it starts on the 1st of May if the legislation is enacted by the 22nd and now we are in the question and answer phase and lot of the questions so far are pertaining to the time frames of the permits."

Courtney Weatherburne
"I think many people are wondering how will this phase out happen or how will it work in terms of on the ground, people or consumers going to the stores and even manufacturers and retailers, how will it work on the ground?"

Maxine Monsanto
"What is proposed in the legislation is a timed phase out, the cutoff date for importation, stop date proposed in this draft is 1st of May, stop date for manufacturing locally is 1st of August, stop date for sale, meaning that you can no longer sell the product in country is 1st of November and the start date for possession saying that at that point we make it a criminal for you to have it for commercial purposes is 1st of December. So the general idea is that it is supposed to slowly stop the product from entering the country, then stop it from being produced in country so you use what is currently available, we are not encouraging you to stock pile because if the proposal if enacted  there won’t be an extension, there is just going to be following those dates and after the 1st of December, the product should no longer be available for commercial use in country so on the ground, you as a law abiding citizen should hopefully not buy the product, use the product, sell the product and it should not be available on the shelves."

The regulation outlines a number of different offenses and their fines as it relates to sale and use of these plastics. For instance, if you are found with 5 styrofoam plates, it will be considered commercial use and it carries a fine and of course, there is the standard option of imprisonment if you do no meet the fine. The fines range from $5,000 to $20,000 depending on the offense. So as we have been reporting it is a serious transition and everyone is urged to read the draft regulation on the DOE website to be informed of all these penalties. We will keep following this phase out process.