SMC assistant environmental health officer Hamzah Matsuka (left) hands over a ‘Skip Straw!’ poster to a coffeeshop operator in Sibu.
SIBU: Sibu Municipal Council (SMC) strives to further raise awareness of the total ban on single-use plastic straws at eateries here from Jan 1,2020.
Yesterday, representatives of the council distributed 20 pieces of ‘Skip Straw!’ posters to coffeeshops across town.
Additionally, 345 copies of this poster had been sent to the Sibu Chinese Chambers of Commerce and Industry for distribution to its members.
Local coffeeshop owners can collect the posters at SMC’s office on Level 20 of Wisma Sanyan here.
Meanwhile SMC Public Health, Environment and Municipal Services Standing Committee chairperson Rhoda Ting reminded all operators of coffeeshops in areas under the council’s jurisdiction to heed the single-use plastic straw ban.
“There is no excuse – we have been doing the awareness programme since April this year.
“So, there’s no excuse by Jan 1 next year, because it (ban on single-use plastic straws) will be among the licensing (application and renewal) conditions for coffeeshops,” she stressed, warning that failure to comply with this requirement would result in the confiscation of the straws and also issuance of compounds to the operators.
An international study, published in January this year, has estimated that as many as 8.3 billion plastic straws are polluting the world’s beaches.
In Malaysia alone, studies have shown that the people are using about 30 million straws per day.
Plastic straws can take up 200 years to disintegrate.