Supermarket shoppers across the country have been asked to ‘Shop and Drop’ on Saturday, April 21, in a day of action facilitated by Voice Ireland and Friends of the Earth.
Customers are being encouraged leave the unwanted plastic packaging on their groceries behind at the checkout after doing their Saturday shop.
The campaign is aimed at raising awareness of the amount of plastic waste being unnecessarily foisted onto the consumer and to put the onus of dealing with the problem back on to the producer.
Louise Heavin, local Green Party representative, will be taking part in the campaign and has welcomed it as a positive move.
“As a consumer, it can be very hard to get away from plastic packaging, much of which is no longer being accepted in people’s recycling bin. This puts the responsibility and the cost of dealing with this sea of waste on the customer. The ‘Shop and Drop’ campaign will throw the focus back onto the producers to put pressure on them to cut the waste at source,” she said.
Ms Heavin thinks the campaign is a timely one.
“I think the Blue Planet series brought home to people the scale of the plastics problem we face. We’ll be approaching a number of supermarkets around the county ahead of this day of action, and hoping for a positive response,” she added.
Full details on the campaign and how to get involved can be found at www.foe.ie/sickofplastic/
