ZEENAT MOORAD: The last (plastic) straw
More and more eateries have either banned, taxed or limited the use of plastic straws
The year is 2018. If you order a freezo (as one does) or a milkshake at tashas you will get a biodegradable straw. Tashas, majority-owned by JSE-listed franchiser Famous Brands, is the latest in a string of eateries to have either banned, taxed or limited the use of plastic straws. In fact, straws are no longer automatically provided with other drinks. Straws are seen as a gateway plastic in the growing environmental campaign against broader plastic pollution. As they don’t naturally degrade, are rarely recycled and tend only to be used once, they are likely to settle on landfills and collect in the ocean. Straw data is hard to come by, but globally 380 Mt of plastic are created annually. And an estimated 8 Mt enter the world’s oceans each year. Scotland, whose parliament has stopped using plastic straws in its own cafés, bar and canteen, will become the first UK country to ban plastic straws. Natasha Sideris, tashas’ founder, tells the Financial Mail that while biodegradable straws...
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