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Article: Swept up: furor over plastic bags tumbling across the landscape sweeps South Africa.(International Update)
- Article from:
- Recycling Today
- Article date:
- April 1, 2004
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2004 G.I.E. Media, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Murphy's Law hit the South African recycling industry in the summer of 2003: Shortly after everyone--government, producers and consumers--thought they had a deal in place to reduce the use of and encourage the recycling of plastic bags, the deal got undermined by one of its largest and earliest supporters.
Recycling efforts in South Africa range from well-organized efforts, like the plastic bag program was conceived to be, to local projects in the townships that exist as much to create jobs as they do to harvest plastic or aluminum.
However, private enterprise already had made great strides in one area: plastic bag recycling. In May of 2003, the ...