Annotated Summary: Zero Waste SG

Zero Waste Singapore. (2018, October 22). Singapore's First Guide For Rating F&B Retailers On Their Efforts To Reduce Plastic Disposables.

Retrieved from  
http://www.zerowastesg.com/2018/10/22/singapores-first-guide-for-rating-fb-retailers-on-their-efforts-to-reduce-plastic-disposables/

In the article “Singapore’s First Guide For Rating F&B Retailers On Their Efforts To Reduce Plastic Disposables”, Zero Waste Singapore (Zero Waste SG) mentioned that they have launched the “BYO (Bring Your Own) Singapore Guide 2018”. The purpose of the guide was to encourage food and beverages (F&B) businesses to be conscious of plastic usage and in turn reduce plastic waste.

The article introduces plastic as an environmental threat since it is not easily decomposable and will give off hazardous by-products that harm the environment. Zero Waste SG also mentioned the reason for introducing this guide was due to Singapore not having any regulations “prohibiting or reducing the use of plastic”. As such, Zero Waste SG went to popular F&B businesses and conducted audits to access their endeavour in reducing plastic usage. After which, they used the data from the audits to create this guide. One of the significant conclusions, Zero Waste SG found, was that 94% of F&B businesses were accepting of consumers request of using the consumers’ own containers.

This article provides useful insights for our research project on reducing single-use plastics for beverages packaging. As Zero Waste SG has conducted the audits and published this guide to promote the reduced use of plastic, this shows that even without governmental influence, organisations and businesses still care for the environment which is shown in the data that the majority of the F&B businesses were accepting of using customers own containers.