The ten biggest UK retailers had a bigger plastic footprint in 2019 than in 2017, meaning they’re not doing enough to cut plastic use. According to a report by the Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) and Greenpeace called Checking Out on Plastics, the supermarkets sold over two billion tons of plastic bags. The study data came from the retailers’ independently verified audits of their plastic footprint – required by the government to be submitted along with their financial reports every year.
The report found:
- The ten biggest UK supermarkets together put 896,853 tons of plastic packaging on the market in 2019 – up 1.2% from 2017.
- The supermarkets sold 1.58 billion “bags for life” and 520 million standard bags (2.1 billion bags in all) in 2019.
- “Bags for life” are intended to be reusable, but the quantity sold equates to an average of 57 bags per UK household – more than one per week, and up 65% from 2017.
- The supermarkets also sold or gave away a significant amount of plastic cutlery: 195.5 million items in 2019 – 52.5 million more than in 2017.
- On the plus side, sales of single-use carrier bags fell by 56% between 2017 and 2019.
The authors wrote:
Overall, the scale of plastic carrier bag usage remains incredibly high … The government charge for single-use carrier bags is due to increase to 10p in April 2021. Still, the data suggests the current plastic’ bag for life’ model, whereby a heavier bag is offered at a slightly higher price to encourage reuse, is not working.
Per supermarket the report found:
- Waitrose ranked as the leader in plastic reduction. It achieved an absolute plastic decrease of 6.1% between 2017 and 2019. It had the lowest plastic use per unit market share of all the retailers.
- Iceland ranked worse in absolute plastic reduction, but it did reduce the plastic in its own-brand products by 29%. Unfortunately, the progress made in with that was offset by the increases in plastic from branded goods. The supermarket has also increased its sales of “bags for life” since 2018.
- Aldi saw the most significant improvement in position, from bottom in 2017 to second place in 2019. Other positive points included eliminating single-use carrier bags and reductions in “bags for life” and ultra-light produce bags. The report also acknowledged the supermarket’s high level of transparency.
- Morrison’s saw the worse drop in position, falling from second place to ninth – mostly because of a rise in plastic bag sales since 2018.
- Lidl saw a plastic reduction of 2.6% in its own brands.
The Guardian approached all ten supermarkets for comment and got the following responses:
A Waitrose spokesperson said:
We’re proud that Greenpeace has recognized our efforts to decrease our plastic packaging footprint. The last 12 months have inevitably created challenges for the industry, but we’re committed to ensuring that by 2023, all own-label packaging will be widely recycled, reusable, or home compostable. Our leadership in innovating to find packaging alternatives or ways to boost reuse will continue at pace this year.
A Tesco spokesperson said:
We recently announced we successfully removed one billion pieces of plastic and got rid of hard-to-recycle materials. Through these actions, Tesco is driving change. We continue to remove excess packaging from our business. Despite the major challenges of COVID-19, we have made good progress in tackling the impact of plastics through our 4Rs packaging strategy – remove, reduce, reuse, recycle – and we have ambitious plans for 2021 and beyond.
An Asda spokesperson said:
We are pleased that Greenpeace has recognized the steps we are taking to reduce plastic waste by highlighting that more than half of the total plastic weight reduction across the industry in 2019 was the result of measures introduced by Asda. However, we know there is more to be done and have an ambitious goal to remove three billion pieces of plastic packaging from our operations by 2025.
A Co-op spokesperson said:
We have one of the smallest plastic footprints of any major food retailer, and almost half of our packaging uses recycled content. We are committed to eliminating unrecyclable plastic and will make all of our packaging recyclable this year. We continue to roll out compostable carrier bags as an alternative to bags for life.
A Sainsbury’s spokesperson said:
We were the first major retailer in the UK to make a significant commitment to reduce our use of plastic packaging by 50% by 2025, and then go further. We reduced plastic by 4% in 2019. We know there is more to do, and by collaborating across the industry, together we can protect the environment for future generations.
The positive news about most supermarkets stopping the sale of single-use plastic bags is good. However, not enough is being done to reduce overall plastic packaging. The report said:
A higher and more consistent trajectory across the board would be expected if plastic reduction efforts were sufficient and having the necessary impact.
Christina Dixon, an Environmental Investigation Agency senior campaigner, said:
In our third year of looking at plastic packaging in UK supermarkets, we had hoped to see a much sharper downwards trajectory as strategies and targets bear fruit. Instead, we are looking at a relatively static picture representing a drop in the ocean of tackling plastic pollution. The sector urgently needs to pick up the pace of plastic reduction.
The report suggested that supermarkets could do more to encourage companies to reduce their plastic. It said:
We urge all the supermarkets to undertake more robust engagement with the major polluting brands, such as Coca-Cola, Nestlé, and PepsiCo, to rapidly scale up initiatives in reuse, refill, recycled content, recyclability, and overall packaging reduction.
Also, the authors call for more transparency:
The next step in terms of increasing transparency in the sector would be to disclose plastic reports in a sector-wide standardized format and to treat these reports like financial audits, having them independently verified and publicly available.
Sian Sutherland, the co-founder of A Plastic Planet campaign group, said:
We call today, yet again, for national reduction targets to be set by our government and for mandatory plastic footprint transparency throughout all supermarkets and industry.
A Plastic Planet launched the world’s first plastic-free aisle in Amsterdam three years ago. However, not much more of an improvement has happened since then. Supermarkets have been giving too many “plastic pledges” and too little real action.
