Plastic carrier bags and creating the registry of producers of products

Draft Royal Decree on reducing plastic carrier bag consumption and creating the registry of producers of products

The objective of this Royal Decree is to adopt measures to reduce plastic carrier bag consumption, in order to minimise the adverse impact that the waste from these plastic carrier bags has on the environment.

In this regard, the measures included in this Royal Decree are as follows:

From 1 March 2018, each lightweight plastic carrier bag and each carrier bag with a wall thickness greater than or equal to 50 micrometres supplied to a consumer shall be subject to a mandatory fee. The price shall be set by the vendor, who may use the indicative prices given in Annex I as a reference.

From 1 January 2020, a permanent ban shall apply to non-compostable lightweight plastic carrier bags. A ban on fragmentable plastic carrier bags shall also apply from this date.

Exemption from the mandatory fee and the ban shall be granted for very lightweight plastic carrier bags, which must also be made from compostable plastic starting from 1 January 2020. From 1 January 2020, carrier bags with a wall thickness equal to or greater than 50 micrometres shall be made from at least 50 % recycled plastic, and a lower indicative price shall be set for these.

Another objective of this Royal Decree is to create the registry of producers of products, which shall also include a section for plastic carrier bag producers, in order to collect information on plastic carrier bags to enable Spain to meet its reporting obligations on plastic carrier bags.