Maltese u-turn on bag tax terms

A report on Newsline from plasticsinpackaging.com:

The Maltese Government has changed its Eco-Contribution Act just a week after it came into force, meaning that plastics bags are now charged per item instead of per kilo. Retailers and manufacturers were enraged by the eco-tax, which came into force on January 1, because it placed an Lm10.67 (US$32) per kilo premium on plastics bags and Lm5 ($15) per kilo on degradable bags. This has been changed to 6 cents (US$0.18) per plastics bag and 1 cent ($0.03) per degradable bag.

Although seemingly favourable to the degradable bag, these bags are in fact heavier than normal plastics ones, meaning that a single degradable bag would have been taxed at 17 cents ($0.50) and cost the consumer 21 cents ($0.63). Biodegradable bags remain untaxed, leading one company, Traplas, to start looking into the production of them.


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