‘Say No to Plastic Waste’ is the 2018 New Year´s Resolution from the Swedish Chamber of Commerce in Hong Kong!
“The world produces more than 300 million tons of plastic every year, including billions of plastic bottles and five billion plastic bags. In Hong Kong alone, we throw away approximately 200 tons of plastic bottles every day! Since plastic does not decompose, and is for the most part not recycled, it needs to go somewhere. Sadly, huge amounts of plastic end up littering our landscape and our oceans. Natural beauty is being ruined, plastic is entering our own food chain, and entire ecosystems are threatened,” writes SwedCham Hong Kong.
SwedCham is through its Sustainability Committee shining a light on this issue. They have screened the award-winning movie Plastic Ocean, and are working with stakeholders, ranging from government to NGO’s, to support the development of an action plan for Hong Kong.
The Swedish business organisation is challenging its members to make resolution on this matter for 2018. Those respond in the affirmative to the following statement, are by default ready to accept the challenge: Starting in 2018, those members will not offer water or other beverages in disposable plastic bottles or cups in our Hong Kong workplace.
Participating companies in the ‘Say No to Plastic Waste’ challenge will be listed on the SwedCham website and in SwedCham publications.
Although SwedCham are expecting government and producers of plastic products to step up and shoulder their responsibility, they firmly believe that all of us, as consumers, need to help with reducing plastic waste at source. That is why SwedCham is reaching out to its members with the challenge.
We are hopeful that a high participation rate among SwedCham members can lead to other chambers of commerce and business organization in Hong Kong accepting the challenge as well!
