The Lagos State Authorities, by way of the Lagos Environmental Sanitation Corps (LAGESC), in any other case generally known as KAI, has carried out enforcement operations in opposition to using single-use plastics (SUP) within the Agege, Oshodi, Idumota, Mushin, Victoria Island, and Lekki market areas of the state.
LAGESC within the operations recorded a joint seizure of N2.5 million value of Styrofoam meals packs and single-use plastics throughout enforcement operations within the Lagos markets and procuring malls previously week.
This disclosure is contained in an announcement launched by LAGESC, the place the company’s Corps Marshal, Main Olaniyi Olatunbosun Cole (Rtd), mentioned the ban on Styrofoam is already in impact and has additionally been prolonged to single-use plastics.
Whereas highlighting the hurt attributable to single-use plastics, Cole revealed how the Lagos State Ministry of Atmosphere’s choice to announce the ban on July 1 stays in the most effective curiosity of the surroundings.
Merchants flouting the order
LAGESC’s Corps Marshal said the company needed to undertake the enforcement because it was found by way of intelligence studies that some merchants in procuring malls and markets had been flouting the order.
The assertion partly reads, ‘’As a part of renewed efforts to rid the metropolis of Styrofoam and Single-Use Plastics (SUPs), the Lagos Environmental Sanitation Corps (LAGESC), popularly generally known as KAI, recorded a joint seizure of N2.5M value of Styrofoam meals packs and SUPs throughout enforcement operations spanning some Lagos markets and procuring malls previously week.
“We found through intelligence studies that there are merchants in procuring malls and markets across the State who preserve flouting the orders of the State, therefore our choice to undertake enforcement operations within the Agege, Oshodi, Idumota, Mushin, Victoria Island and Lekki market areas, which resulted in a seizure of the banned merchandise value N2.5 million.’’
He additionally defined how plastic waste constitutes a adverse risk to the coastal surroundings and the hazards it poses to public well being in Lagos.
The retired Main said that different gadgets banned within the single-use class are plastic straws, plastic cutlery, and all single-use service baggage, nylons which have lower than 40-micron thickness, placing to relaxation the misinformation at the moment peddled by mischief makers in regards to the ban.
Whole compliance
Reiterating the carpet ban on Styrofoam, the Corps Marshal emphasised the necessity for whole compliance with the eradication of Styrofoam meals containers and every kind of polystyrene cups, together with disposable cups that possess no recycling worth on account of their non-biodegradable nature, which poses hurt to the surroundings.
The Corps Marshal, subsequently, learn the riot act to merchants to desist from buying and selling in Styrofoam, SUPs, displaying wares on the market on highway setbacks, lay-bys, medians, verges, and gutter slabs, stressing that these actions are unlawful underneath the State’s environmental legal guidelines.
Underscoring the necessity for pedestrians’ security whereas crossing highways, the KAI prime man advocated for the suitable use of pedestrian bridges, simply as he warned Lagosians to chorus from partaking in open urination, defecation, and indiscriminate dumping of refuse, which blocks the drains and prevents the movement of storm water into the canals.
What it’s best to know
The ban on single-use plastic first commenced in January 2024, when the Lagos State Ministry of the Atmosphere and Water Assets introduced a prohibition on the utilization and distribution of styrofoam and different single-use plastics.
The state authorities had, in its clarification, said that its state-wide ban on Single Use Plastics (SUPs) doesn’t embody PET bottles, sachet water, and nylon service baggage above 40-micron thickness.
