Croatia bans single-use plastic products

Croatia has adopted a new law on waste management which bans the sale of single-use plastic products, joining the group of European Union (EU) member states that have transposed the Directive on single-use plastics into national legislation.

The law, which comes into force in the coming days, some single-use plastic products will be banned immediately, including plastic straws, plates, cutlery (forks, spoons, knives and chopsticks), polystyrene food containers, etc.

Plastic bags will be banned from January 2022, and bottles with a plastic lid from July 2024

Some other products will be banned in the coming years. A ban on plastic bags, except for very light ones, will take effect in January 2022, while products with a plastic lid, such as bottles and other containers, will not be allowed from July 3, 2024.

The deadline to ban single-use plastics in EU countries was July 3 this year

The EU’s Directive on single-use plastics came into force in 2019, and member states were given until July 3, 2021 to adopt regulations banning single-use plastic products.

However, only a handful of EU member states had complied with the Directive by that deadline, according to earlier reports.