Behavioural response to plastic bag legislation in Botswana

Abstract

This paper investigates the use of charges and standards in dealing with a common externality, plastic litter from shopping bags in Botswana. The country passed a plastic bag legislation (effective 2007) to curb the plastic bag demand. Uniquely, the act does not stipulate the amount that the retailers had to charge for plastic bags, they, independently from one another, set different prices. We assessed the environmental effectiveness and efficiency of the plastic bag legislation by analysing consumers' sensitivity to the improvement of the plastic bag and related price charges. The introduction of the plastic bag legislation led to a significant decline in the consumption of plastic bags per 1,000 Botswana pulas of shopping. The partial success of the charges levied in Botswana was due to the constantly high prices of the bags. © 2012 The Authors.