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CCC HAILS APPROVAL OF ANTI-SINGLE USE PLASTIC BILL IN HOUSE

The Climate Change Commission welcomes the approval of House Bill 9147, which seeks to regulate and phase out single-use plastics, in the House of Representatives on Wednesday, July 28.

The passage of the Single-Use Plastic Products Bill in the House brings us leaps closer to a plastic-free Philippines, and we thank our legislators in the House for responding to the clamor of the public and to the needs of our planet, in passing this bill.

HB 9147, titled “An Act Regulating the Production, Importation, Sale, Distribution, Provision, Use, Recovery, Collection, Recycling, and Disposal of Single-Use Plastic Products” or the Single-Use Plastic Products Regulation Act consolidates 41 House bills filed by various representatives, including House Speaker Lord Allan Velasco.

Earlier this year, the CCC lent its expertise and provided input in crafting the substitute bill during Technical Working Group meetings chaired by Rep. Kiko Benitez under the House Committee on Ecology chaired by Rep. Glona Labadlabad.

The approved bill eyes to establish a tiered system for classifying single-use plastic products, which will be phased out in varying periods. It also provides for both demand-side and supply side interventions, including the development of alternatives, providing incentives for consumers, retailers, and manufacturers, and changing behaviors.

The bill also seeks to institute an Extended Producers Responsibility program, which will hold producers responsible for collecting and recycling the amount of plastic that they produce and introduce into the market through recovery schemes like redemption, buy-back, and off-setting; transportation of recovered plastic waste; clean-ups in coastal areas, roads, and other sites; and the establishment of recycling, composting, thermal treatment, and other facilities.

We look forward to the passage of the Senate version of the bill, so we can catch up to global standards and solve the massive plastic pollution which has been cited to come from our communities, through the rivers and to the oceans. We must have a unified national policy to deal with plastics, long treated as "disposable" and the problems it brings in terms of health, waste, and the environment.

More than 127 countries have already passed regulations to stem the production, distribution, use, and disposal of plastic, while close to 500 LGUs in the country have already adopted ordinances regulating single-use plastics.

The CCC, led by its Chairperson-designate Finance Secretary Carlos G. Dominguez, has earlier said that a national law will strengthen the impact of these local ordinances, emphasizing that it is aligned with the aims of the bill “to advance realistic solutions to address the challenge of single-use plastics pollution and provide a clear pathway for the pursuit of sustainable consumption and production.”