The UK Public Shows Support For Action On Plastic Packaging From Supermarkets

The YouGov survey discovered that out of 2000 people, only 44 admitted to feeling sorry for the environment if they bought bottled water and only a third of the participants drink from reusable bottles. However, a recent poll commissioned by Greenpeace discovered that the UK public is expecting from supermarkets in tackling plastic packaging and plastic pollution.

The UK government previously announced a £61.4 million fund to tackle “scourge” of ocean plastic, following an announcement of a bottle deposit return scheme and a promise from the government to eliminate avoidable plastic waste by 2042.

Despite the results of the YouGov study, the New Populus shows that almost nine out of ten people surveyed (89 percent) are concerned about plastic pollution. Levels of concern over the issue have increased over the past 12 months, with 67 percent of people saying they are more concerned about ocean plastic than they were a year ago. While 32 percent have maintained their level of concern and just one percent is less interested than this time of the year.

The poll shows that 72 percent of the participants think that supermarkets are not doing enough about plastic packaging to address the problem of pollution and 84 percent find it challenging to avoid plastic packaging in their local supermarket shops. 86 percent promote the idea of supermarket shops shifting to more reusable and refillable plastics.

While it has been reported that only 31 percent announced that their local supermarket had taken action in reducing the amount of plastic packaging, 91 percent believes that supermarkets should be working on decreasing the amount of plastic packaging they use. Furthermore, over a half (55 percent) said that they would prefer to shop at supermarkets that do not overpackage products.

The findings of the YouGov study showed that supermarkets in the UK are not doing enough on reducing the waste of plastic packaging despite the alarming numbers of plastic waste that mostly ends up in oceans every day. The United Nations has announced that 360 million tonnes of plastic are produced each year, warns that the number is set to almost double to 619 million tonnes by 2030.

For the study, Populus interviewed 2,062 of UK adults online between June 1-3 2018. The surveys were administered across the country, and results have been weighted to the profile of all respondents.

“People all across the UK are on the same page: ocean plastic pollution needs tackling, and it is urgent that supermarkets take meaningful action to reduce their plastic footprint now. If I were the CEO of a supermarket looking at these figures, I’d be making some pretty frantic phone calls right now,” Elena Polisano, oceans campaigner of Greenpeace UK.