Plastics bring both convenience and pollution to human society. During this year's two sessions, a number of NPC deputies from the petroleum and chemical industries discussed the issue of accelerating the promotion of degradable plastics, eliminating white pollution, and truly shaping green life.

Accelerating the treatment of white pollution, promoting plastic replacement products in a scientific and prudent manner, and reducing the use of non-degradable plastics are important means to protect the ecological environment, reduce carbon emissions, and promote sustainable economic development. To this end, Liao Zengtai, a deputy to the National People's Congress, Party Secretary and chairman of Wanhua Chemical Group Co., LTD., proposed to improve the long-term supervision mechanism of biodegradable plastics and strengthen cooperation with the whole life cycle management of the industry.

"To fundamentally solve white pollution, we must promote fully biodegradable materials with clear testing standards, clear certification procedures, thorough research on soil degradation mechanism, and widely recognized worldwide." Liao Zengtai suggested that, in accordance with the requirements of The State Council "reform Plan for Deepening standardization work", a comprehensive review, update and formulation of relevant standards, further improve the unified and standardized certification system of biodegradable plastic products, and scientifically define the degradable standards; Establish a white list of pure resins for all biodegradable plastics, define all biodegradable from the perspective of pure polymers, publish and revise the list of polymers that can pass all biodegradable standards in real time, create a rapid detection method according to the material structure to identify the material type of the product for sampling, and standardize the regulatory standards for degradable plastics. At the same time, penalties for illegal production, sale and use of non-degradable materials should be increased to prevent secondary pollution caused by "pseudo-degradable" materials, as well as disrupting the market for biodegradable plastics. This will help local market supervision and other relevant departments to quickly, efficiently and reasonably identify biodegradable products, strengthen market supervision, improve the implementation of the national plastic ban policy, and adhere to the bottom line of quality, safety and environmental protection of biodegradable plastic products.

Since December 1, 2020, Hainan Province has banned the production, sale and use of disposable non-degradable plastic film bags and plastic dining utensils, which has achieved good environmental protection results. Liao Zengtai suggested that the pilot plastic ban should be further expanded, and the use and sale of disposable non-degradable plastics should be completely banned in municipalities, provincial capitals and first-tier cities, and the plastic ban should be extended from the existing daily packaging such as shopping bags, rolled bags, garbage bags and takeout packaging to the express packaging required by the e-commerce sector (including cushion packaging such as hulu film and air column film). Dustproof packaging of household appliances and other plastic products prone to pollution, plastic mulch in agricultural field, and formulate relevant incentive measures such as tax relief to encourage enterprises to ban plastic and limit plastic, to achieve effective replacement of biodegradable plastics, and promote the green development of plastic industry.

Liao also suggested establishing and improving a collection, transportation and disposal system for biodegradable plastic waste, encouraging the construction of aerobic composting facilities, and strengthening whole-life closed-loop management. Biodegradable film bag products can be composted with kitchen waste, agricultural waste, animal manure, etc., which can not only reduce environmental pollution after complete degradation, but also return the harmless compost organic matter to the ecosystem, realize recycling, and improve soil fertility. He suggested pilot composting stations be introduced in key urban communities in China to reduce the amount of kitchen waste and biodegradable garbage bags in communities on the spot, helping to raise the level of harmless plastic waste disposal across the country.

Zheng Yueming, a deputy to the National People's Congress and chairman of Lianhong New Materials Technology Co., LTD., also said that although China has become the world's largest producer of biodegradable plastics, the industry still has problems such as low enthusiasm for market use due to high cost, imperfect recycling policies and facilities, insufficient research on recycling, and a mixed market.

He has four suggestions. First, increase policy support to promote the application of biodegradable plastics. Combined with garbage classification, we will strengthen science popularization, strengthen the implementation and supervision of the "plastic limit" policy, and further classify and scientifically promote biodegradable plastics according to different application scenarios, so as to truly solve the problem of environmental protection. For example, the application of fully biodegradable agricultural mulch can avoid recycling problems, and the use of tableware and garbage bags that can be composted with kitchen waste can reduce sorting costs.

The second is to improve the terminal classification system and recycling and treatment infrastructure of biodegradable plastics. Biodegradable plastics will be added to waste classification, and waste landfills will be converted into industrial composting plants to dispose of biodegradable products that cannot be recycled.

Third, improve the recycling level of biodegradable plastics. To support the development of relevant technologies, and promote the formation of an exemplary industrial chain for the production, use, recycling, treatment and recycling of biodegradable plastics.

Fourth, we should further improve the standard system of biodegradable plastic products, strengthen market supervision and management of biodegradable labels, and intensify punishment on "pseudo-degradable" products to promote the healthy and orderly development of the market.

Tong Mingquan, a deputy to the National People's Congress and director of the Chemical Research Institute of Huayang New Materials Group, believes that due to wrong understanding, green marketing and blind promotion, the biodegradable materials industry has a certain degree of confusion, such as the limited alternative market, the degradation conditions of some materials, high prices, uneven quality, etc., and the development of certain obstacles.

Tong suggested strengthening the publicity of plastic pollution control; Standardize the management of disposable plastic products, strengthen the law enforcement of plastic ban; Application demonstration of strong biodegradable materials; To provide policy support to the biodegradable materials industry. He also suggested that the government should accelerate the promotion and application of fully biodegradable mulching film through unified procurement and supply to farmers, and increase support for the research and development of biodegradable mulching film formula, demonstration and promotion projects.