The UK should follow France’s lead by banning single-use packaging for customers who are eating or drinking in, says Jane Martin.
McDonald’s, one of the world’s most-loved fast-food guilty pleasures, is thought to produce almost three tonnes of packaging waste every minute, adding up to nearly 1.5 million tonnes per year. In France alone, this was thought to total 115 tonnes of packaging per day. When this level of waste is representative of just one fast-food chain, albeit one of the world’s largest, it is clear how unsustainable single-use packaging has become in dine-in settings.
This is a problem that France, a country synonymous with culinary tradition and disdain for poor-quality food, acted on. In 2023, new regulations required all brasseries, cafés and multinational chains, with more than 20 seats per venue, to provide reusable packaging for all of their food. The results have been striking.
The 30,000 fast-food outlets in France that serve approximately six million tonnes of food per year, generating an estimated 180,000 tonnes of waste, have had to completely rethink how they serve their food, now offering all of their meals in washable, reusable packaging.
With the new UK Government looking for easy and cost-effective ways to begin the transition to a circular economy, with a long-term target of zero waste by 2050, where better to begin? This stand-alone policy will in itself, shift an entire sector from single-use to reuse.
This policy, as Footprint has reported, was strongly opposed by fast-food retailers, who funnelled huge resources into lobbying to prevent the passing of the ban. In the long-term, however, it is likely that these changes actually save them money.
With the introduction of an EPR approach (which is likely to include a mandatory takeback scheme for single-use fibre-based cups), sticking to disposables will come at a significant cost for businesses that can be avoided by moving to reusable packaging. With the global tide slowly turning against plastic, businesses that handle the change best will be those that begin transitioning sooner, rather than later.
Like any good policy, it will take industry and consumers time to adjust. Some restaurants will need to alter their practices to follow the new rules, such as hiring extra support to clean and reuse packaging that wasn’t necessary before, as well as investing in dishwashers and reusables. However, the initial investment will deliver a fairly quick return investment given the rising costs of single-use.
Consumers will also need to learn about separating their waste when dining in so reusable packaging isn’t thrown away. The government must therefore give businesses time to adjust and educate consumers on why these changes are necessary.
The new government has an opportunity to listen to the 26,000 people, and growing, who have signed our petition calling for a complete ban on single-use packaging in dine-in settings. This is a popular policy that holds the key to a reusable future, allowing Labour to tackle the country’s plastic problem head-on and stepping up for reuse.
Jane Martin is CEO of City to Sea.
