ON JUNE 1, 2008, a national regulation was introduced forbidding stores from providing plastic grocery bags to customers for free. The regulation requires supermarkets or shops to charge customers for such bags in order to reduce their use. However, People's Daily recently reported that large quantities of such carrier bags are still being used in supermarkets and shops every day. Beijing News comments:

People's Daily quoted a survey that looks rather terrible: Small shops still provide plastic bags for free despite the ban, while supermarkets sell large quantities of them every day.

Many people still have the habit of using plastic grocery bags and each family has a few such bags to dispose of every day. It seems the only difference the ban has made is consumers have to pay additional money for the plastic carrier bags they get from supermarkets.