Supermarket giant ASDA has pledged to scrap 5p plastic bags entirely by the end of the year.
The supermarket chain is launching an initiative to reduce the amount of plastic it uses in all its packaging by 10 per cent within 12 months.
CEO Roger Burnley announced on Monday that the company would be taking drastic measures to reduce the amount of plastic it uses.
The initiative includes scrapping 5p plastic bags entirely by the end of 2018 and switching 2.4 million plastic straws used in its cafes to paper.
Money made from selling ASDA’s bags for life will continue to go towards charity.
Mr Burnley also revealed that the supermarket will be eliminating single use coffee cups and plastic cutlery from its offices by the end of the year as part of its war on plastic.
“Where we are able to go faster and harder to remove avoidable plastics from our products, we will,” he said.
“Our logic is to remove plastic wherever we can, and where it is required, to make it as recyclable as possible,” he continued.
The company announced that it will also be launching “zero profit” reusable coffee cups to “reduce customer’s (sic) reliance on single use cups” while it works to remove them from its shops and cafes by the end of 2019.
In order to tackle the issue of plastic head on, the company said that it would be partnering with experts in packaging and technology at Leeds Beckett University Retail Institute along with UK supplier ABP to find alternatives to plastic materials.
Mr Burnley said: “I want ASDA’s customers to know that they can trust us to take the lead on the issues that really matter to them.
“So we have challenged ourselves to look at what more we can do to reduce the amount of plastic in our business and within our sector as a whole.”
The announcements follow a previous pledge made by the company to to make all its own-brand packaging recyclable by 2025.
