[A street vendor selling the new type of shopping bags. Traders and consumers in Nyamira have complained that the bags are more expensive than the plastic bags. Photo|The East African]
Nyamira County Traders and consumers are now feeling the pinch of the imposed ban on plastic bags in Kenya by the National Environment Management Authority (NEMA). According to entrepreneurs in the county, coping with the plastic carriers has been tough since the ban took effect on August 28 last year.
It is just four months down the line since the NEMA ban on plastic bags took effect and traders and consumers have already started to cry foul of the directive.
According to the Nyamira traders, the government should have provided them with a cheaper alternative to the plastic bags which used to cost Sh10 at maximum compared to the current bags costing more than Sh20.
According to Samuel Orina, one of the small kiosk operators, traders conducting business on a small-scale level are the ones who are suffering the most from the ban.
“A customer can come to my shop and buy vegetables for Sh20, yet the bag costs Sh30 or Sh50. The bags are too much expensive for us that we can’t even gain profit from the Sh20 given to us when one customer buys vegetables. Small-scale traders are not making any profits,” said Orina.
According to Bernard Obaigwa, a consumer, the traders are selling the current alternative bags expensively that they find it difficult to buy.
“The bags are very expensive and that is a great challenge for us because sometimes you leave the house having forgotten to carry the one you bought previously thus you are forced to spend for what you had not planned for,” said Obaigwa.
According to experts, plastic bags take up to 100 years to decompose thus posing an environmental risk to life on land and water bodies. According to statistics by the United Nations Environment Program, it is projected that by the year 2050 the amount of plastic in the water bodies will outnumber available fish.