Organic shopping bags, a hidden fee is charged

Not only light, gas, highways: with the new year comes another increase, hidden and "deceitful" which in the long run - penny after penny, day after day, expense after expense - will have a significant impact on the pockets of all of us. It is the obligatory cost of the new plastic bags for food packaging.

It all stems from a law (123/2017) which transposes an EU directive from 3 years ago (2015/720) which establishes that starting from 1 January 2018 all the bags used in the fruit and vegetable, gastronomy, butcher, fishmonger and bakery (defined as "ultralight") must be made of biodegradable and compostable materials, compliant with international standards. And it is a positive measure, long overdue also to stem the danger of the invasion of plastic which pollutes the environment and above all the sea with devastating effects on the fauna.

Well, but be careful. In the folds of the law it is established that "Plastic bags in ultra-light material cannot be distributed free of charge and for this purpose the sale price for each unit must result from the receipt or purchase invoice of the goods or products packaged for the through them".

So for each pack wrapped in "ultralight" bags there is a surcharge. How much? Initial hypotheses speak of costs ranging from 3 to 7 cents per envelope, depending on the formats. And every time we go shopping, how many products in "ultralight" bags do we buy? And how many times do you go shopping in a week, a month, a year? And even admitting – as some supermarket chains already promise – that the. cost for consumers is limited to just 1 cent, in the end cent after cent, expense after expense, day after day, it quickly reaches tens of euros in surcharge.

In addition, on the basis of the European regulation then taken up by a note from the Ministry of the Environment (n.14624 of 18.10.2017) for health and hygiene reasons the use of bags other than those made available is not permitted in store departments; in order not to run the risk of contamination, the possibility of using bags is not contemplated, or any type of packaging, bring don the outside. In short, it is useless to think of avoiding the payment of a "bag surcharge" by using your own bag brought from home.

And obviously there are fines for those shops, resales, supermarkets that do not comply with the new provisions: from 2.500 to 25 thousand euros.