The battle between the world’s leading retailers to deliver the deepest cuts in plastic bag use intensified last week when supermarket giant Wal-Mart announced it is to cut plastic shopping bag waste from its stores globally by a third by 2013.

The company, which owns Asda in the UK, said that the move would eliminate more than 135 million lbs of plastic waste a year, cut CO2 emissions by 290,000 tonnes and slash energy consumption to the equivalent of 678,000 barrels of oil.

Announcing the target at the Clinton Global Initiative Annual Meeting in New York, Matt Kistler, senior vice president for sustainability of Wal-Mart Stores, said that the company would seek to change its customers’ behaviour by reducing the number of plastic bags it hands out, cutting the cost of reusable bags, and increasing the availability of recycling points. Read more

Source: Business Green