Development trend of China's plastic packaging market: green and environmental protection become the main theme of the industry

Plastic prohibition orders or plastic restriction orders issued by countries around the world, a summary of China's policies on "plastic restriction orders" and "plastic prohibition orders", and a summary and interpretation of China's provinces and cities on plastic restriction and plastic prohibition policies

Plastic restrictions in various countries have been tightened

PE, pet, PP and PS are the most commonly used raw materials in plastic packaging. These plastics are derived from petroleum and have strong resistance to biodegradation. After use, they will have inevitable negative consequences for the environment.

In recent years, more and more countries and regions have issued plastic restriction orders or plastic prohibition orders, and a consensus has been reached on restricting the use of disposable plastic packaging and the environmental protection and greening of plastic packaging.

Provinces across the country are carrying out collaborative efforts to control plastic pollution

In China, since 2007, the state has successively issued the notice of the general office of the State Council on restricting the production and sales of plastic shopping bags, the opinions on Further Strengthening the treatment of plastic pollution in 2020, and the development plan of circular economy in the 14th five year plan in 2021 to guide the transformation and development of plastic packaging industry towards green and environmental protection.

The national development and Reform Commission and the Ministry of ecology and environment issued the opinions on further strengthening plastic pollution control in early 2020, which clearly put forward the "timetable" for further strengthening plastic pollution control:

In 2020, take the lead in banning the production, sale and use of some plastic products in some regions and fields.

In 2022, the consumption of disposable plastic products will be significantly reduced, and alternative products will be promoted.

In 2025, the whole link management system of plastic products will be established, and plastic pollution will be effectively controlled.

In order to do a good job in plastic pollution control, all provinces across the country are carrying out coordinated operations, and have successively launched plastic restriction and prohibition timetables.

Plastic restriction order and plastic ban order open the development space of degradable plastics

According to the report released by the organization for economic cooperation and development (OECD) in 2018, the global output of plastic waste has continued to increase since 2015, exceeding 300 million tons per year, and it is predicted to reach about 12 billion tons by 2050. According to the data of the National Engineering Research Center for engineering plastics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, about 35% of the hundreds of millions of tons of plastic waste in the world were recycled in 2019, with incineration and cracking accounting for about 12%, stacking or landfill accounting for 46% and flowing into the ocean accounting for about 7%. If not curbed, by 2025, there will be 1 ton of plastic for every 3 tons of fish in the ocean; By 2050, plastic will weigh more than fish.

Waste plastics are seriously polluted. Countries not only tighten the use of plastic packaging from the source through plastic restriction orders and plastic prohibition orders, but also look for alternatives from downstream applications. Developed countries and large multinational enterprises in the world have gradually attached importance to the treatment and application of renewable plastics. Many countries have promised that the recycling and reuse rate of plastic packaging will not be less than 35% by 2030, which provides development space for renewable plastics and degradable plastic materials.

Since 2013, with the improvement of environmental protection awareness and the promotion of waste classification, the domestic waste plastics recycling volume has gradually increased, and the quality of recycled waste plastics has been improved simultaneously. However, China's waste plastic recycling system is still not perfect, the market raw material recycling is still dominated by retail recycling, and the main body of raw material supply is still dominated by small family workshops. This recycling model has the disadvantages of low recycling rate and unable to package the continuous and stable supply of recycled materials, which is difficult to be promoted to the level of developed countries. By 2020, the national plastic scrap volume has reached 74.1 million tons, with recycling accounting for only 30%, landfill accounting for 32%, incineration accounting for 31% and abandonment accounting for 7%.

In 2020, China's plastic recycling volume will be 22.23 million tons. According to the development plan of industrial green development plan (2016-2020), the plastic recycling volume will reach 23 million tons by 2020. According to the situation in 2020, there is still a certain gap in the amount of plastic recycling.

In order to further reduce the pollution of plastic packaging and encourage the development of degradable plastics, in recent years, the state has continuously issued policies to encourage the development of degradable plastics and environmentally friendly plastics. On July 7, 2021, the national development and Reform Commission issued the 14th five year plan for the development of circular economy, which requires that by 2025, the recycling capacity of renewable resources will be further improved and the substitution ratio of renewable resources to primary resources will be further increased. In the future, in the plastic packaging industry, the application proportion of environmentally friendly and green degradable plastics will continue to increase.