A new bill filed at the House of Representatives seeks to impose a P10 excise tax on single-use plastic bags.
Instead of plastic bags, alternatives that are environment-friendly must be used. These alternatives, however, are not new to the market. People have already been using paper bags and eco-bags for years now in place of plastics.
IN A move seen to discourage the public from utilizing single-use plastic bags, a proposed bill that seeks to impose a P10 excise tax on the product was approved on Wednesday by the House Committee of Appropriations.
The proposed measure, House Bill No. 178 aims to limit the use of single-use plastic bags in factories and imports – “for every single-use plastic bag removed from the place of production or released from the customs house” – by imposing a P10 tax per plastic bag.
Nueva Ecija 1st District Estrellita B. Suansing is the bill’s author. This is the solution she proposed to combat the difficulty of disposing the plastic bags.
“We are just controlling the use of plastic bags,” she said at the hearing. “We are not banning the use of plastic bags in this bill.”
Instead of plastic bags, she said, alternatives that are environment-friendly must be used. These alternatives, however, are not new to the market. People have already been using paper bags and eco-bags for years now in place of plastics.
According to the bill, 50 percent of the collected Plastic Bag Tax will go to the Solid Waste Management Fund of the Ecological Solid Waste Management Act of 2000.
The remaining 50% will go to the general fund. (EFO)