Philippines to tax single-use plastics

The Philippines’ lower house of Congress approved on Monday a measure that would slap taxes on single-use plastics, in step with President Ferdinand Marcos Jr’s commitment to tackle ocean pollution. A tax of 100 pesos ($1.75) would be levied on firms for every kilogram of single-used plastics that they produce or import, the bill said, and it would rise by 4 per cent annually starting in 2026 to discourage usage and protect the environment. Roughly 80 per cent of global ocean plastic comes from Asian rivers, and the Philippines alone contributes a third of that total, according to a 2021 report by Oxford University’s Our World in Data.