The Legal Notice imposing the new 15c eco tax on all plastic bags has not been published so retailers were not legally obliged to charge for such bags, the Chamber for Small and Medium Enterprises, GRTU said.

It said that as it was unacceptable for the authorities to force retailers to make changes to their cash registers or point of sales system, it had proposed that once this tax was imposed retailers should sell the bags in the same way as other stock items. It seemed that the government was in favour of this idea.

The retailer, the chamber said, would sell the bags at a price that would include the price of the bag, the tax, a profit margin and value added tax. Each sale would appear on the sales receipt as a separate stock item. Plastic bags would not be given out for free once a legal notice is published.

The chamber said that all efforts were being made to ensure that all illicit trading on plastic bags would stop.

It said it supported the government’s efforts to safeguard the environment from the excessive burden of millions of plastic bags thrown out freely through retail outlets.