The multitude of European consumer protection rights in consumer sales sector aims to encourage Europeans to, well, go shopping. However, if we shop and purchase something we need to transport it back to our homes often in a shopping bag. If that shopping bag happens to be a plastic bag and upon coming home we immediately discard of it (since we may not want to start a collection of plastic shopping bags), what we may not realize is that it will take hundreds of years for the environment to get rid of that lightweight plastic bag. (Commission proposes to reduce the use of plastic bags) Therefore, yesterday the European Commission adopted a proposal of a Directive to reduce lightweight plastic bag consumption in the EU, which will amend the existing Packaging and Packaging Waste Directive. It will be left to the Member States to choose appropriate measure that would lead to the reduction of plastic bag consumption, e.g., charges or bans (some Member States already have such measures in place).
