The project is funded by Handelens Miljøfond

Since the introduction of plastic in industry and private households during the 1950’s its image has changed significantly from a jack-of-all-trades to a problem child. The boom of short-lived plastic products (single-use) in combination with inadequate end-of-life treating and low recycling rates, leads to the material spilling into the environment in enormous quantities. Today, the usefulness of plastic bags, packaging, and other products, is outweighed by the damage it does to nature, people’s health and wellbeing and the economy. To counteract the negative consequences of plastic pollution, a wide range of policies, such as levy’s and incentives, and technical solutions, such as biodegradable plastics, have been developed. Nevertheless, none of these attempts has shown large-scale and long-term success and plastic pollution keeps rising. Often, solutions are poorly implemented because of human factors: it is underestimated how people interact with new technologies, how they use biodegradables or if an intervention might cause rebound effects. With plastic pollution being a purely anthropogenic problem, we therefore suggest focussing our attention on human perceptions and behaviour. Only if we understand how people perceive the problem and why they behave the way they do, appropriate interventions can be developed. 

In the proposed study, we will focus on plastic bag consumption due to its relevance and popularity in the South African context. We will assess the psychological and situational drivers and barriers that determine the acquisition of plastic bags in the supermarket, their usage and different options of disposal. An interdisciplinary team from South Africa (environmental sciences and geography) and Norway (social and environmental psychology) is coming together with the relevant expertise regarding local circumstances, waste management systems, data collection, methodologies and human behaviour. In specific, we will look at 1) What are the behaviours leading to plastic bags being consumed in such a high rate and 2) What are the behaviours leading to plastic bags being spilled in the environment? We will apply a multi-methods approach consisting of A) a status review, B) a survey as well as C) observations (see project flow chart below), together feeding into the development of a pilot intervention. The status review will comprise key literature, policy reports and first-hand experiences from selected stakeholders in South Africa (e.g. waste management sector, retail, education, politics and tourism).