UMNO Calls For Complete Ban on Plastic Imports in Malaysia

SEATTLE (Scrap Monster): Mohamed Khaled Nordin- the vice president of Malaysia’s leading political outfit UMNO has called upon the nation’s government to impose ban on plastic imports into the country over the period of next five years. Further he noted that Malaysia should aim at becoming a net zero waste nation.

According to him, the country has been a dumping yard of world’s waste over the past several years. For instance, the country’s plastic imports from the UK alone have skyrocketed by nearly 63% from 40,007 tonnes in 2019 to 65,316 tonnes in 2020. The imports have recorded steady rise in volumes since 2015.

He lauded the efforts of the current as well as previous governments in returning containers containing illegal waste to their port of origins. However, this is quite inadequate, if there has to be an end to the flow of waste into the country. As a first step, the country should come up with a plan to impose total ban on plastic waste imports over the next half a decade. For this, the country should consider China’s policies as model.

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Mohamed Khaled Nordin also called for increased investments in waste management and recycling infrastructure and policies. Currently, most of the plastic waste either ends up in landfills or are incinerated. Surprisingly, the country recycles only 10% of its plastic waste.