New York's plastic bag ban: progress and challenges five years later

New York’s plastic bag ban: progress and challenges five years later

Posted on 20/03/2025

New York State has had a ban on the distribution of single-use plastic bags since 2020, but it is still not uncommon to come across one on the streets.

@Canva

In 2020, the State of New York instituted a ban on single-use plastic bag sales to reduce waste and greenhouse gas emissions from their production. Before the ban took effect, New Yorkers used about 23 billion plastic bags a year, 85% of which ended up in landfills, waterways, or on streets.

“the quantity of plastic bags entering the waste stream has decreased by 68%”
Five years later, the effect is tangible, though not yet definitive. According to a study carried out by the New York City Department of Sanitation, plastic bags in the trash stream decreased by 68% between 2017 and 2023.

Yet, despite this considerable decline, plastic bags remain a ubiquitous presence around the city. This is partially because of legal loopholes permitting use in particular circumstances, for example, wrapping bulk items in groceries stores or dispensing prescription drugs from chemists. Restaurants are not subject to the ban either.

Economic impact on small businesses

Its implementation has been made challenging, most notably by the cost to small businesses. Some retailers in wealthier neighborhoods have instituted reusable bags for sale, while businesses in poorer neighborhoods have continued to offer plastic bags at a temporary basis to try not to charge more to customers. This reflects a common dilemma with small business owners across New York, as they have been struggling to be able to afford sustainable alternatives.

The Bag Waste Reduction Act, which took effect March 1, 2020, was delayed by the pandemic and a court challenge from plastic bag manufacturers. The bill has a tiered penalty scheme: after a warning, sellers may be fined $250 for a second offense and $500 for each one thereafter.

Despite the difficulties in enforcing the ban, it has helped reduce plastic pollution in New York considerably. Yet stricter enforcement of the penalties, along with increased assistance for companies in the transition to sustainable substitutes, might be necessary for the policy to gain a hold.

Australia’s giant earthworm: a fragile underground colossus

The Gippsland giant earthworm is among the world's largest, but remains difficult to study. Discover the secrets of this unique species

@NHM_Science

Deep beneath Australian ground, between patches of sodden clay and silent underground passages, lies one of the world’s most impressive and mysterious invertebrates: the Gippsland giant earthworm (Megascolides australis). This underground colossus, up to 10 feet long, emits a gurgling sound when it moves underground. However, despite being of huge size, it is surprisingly fragile and difficult to study.

A vulnerable giant

Unlike other garden earthworms, the Gippsland giant earthworm is not only long but also extremely delicate. Its mere touching with a spade or agricultural tool will kill it—its body shatters on injury, and the worm will only seldom survive. That leaves it in a very vulnerable situation because of habitat destruction and human activities such as intensive farming and groundwater reduction, both of which threaten its existence.

By Dr. Beverley Van Praagh, the species expert, the only way to find one without hurting it is to listen really carefully for sounds made underground. A Gippsland giant earthworm alarmed quickly pulls back into its burrow with a noise similar to water running out of a bath.

A stunning hidden biodiversity

The Gippsland giant earthworm is not the only incredible worm to have been found in Australia. The continent’s species richness is impressive, with most of its species unknown to science. According to Australian Museum‘s Dr. Pat Hutchings, quoted in The Guardian, a more than three-foot sea worm, Eunice dharastii, was spotted in shallow northern Sydney waters lured out of its crevice by fish bait. Other samples found in the Kimberley region are so vast they could be wrapped around a person’s neck like a living scarf.

An uncertain future for these underground giants

The Gippsland giant earthworm is a long-lived but slow-reproducing species. It lays a single egg, wrapped in an amber-colored cocoon, and it takes an entire year for the young worm to grow up. Such a low rate of reproduction makes it very sensitive to changes in the environment.

The main hazards facing this species are groundwater depletion, habitat fragmentation, and agricultural mechanization, which brings up the entire complex network of tunnels that it lives within. If its habitat is not saved, the Gippsland giant earthworm could soon become nothing but a memory of Australia’s incredible diversity.