The year 2018 has seen numerous plastic bans being imposed in India and even outside India. Countries like UK, Iceland and even EU has imposed a plastic ban this year and suddenly, every country is thinking on the same page. In India, the ban was imposed in Maharashtra on 23rd March 2018 with 3-months time to dispose of the existing stocks. The question that has been raised is regarding the effectiveness, appropriateness and applicability of this ban on single-use plastics.

Plastic has been defined by the National Sanitation Foundation (NSF) International "as a material that contains as an essential ingredient an organic substance of high molecular weight, is solid in its finished state, and at some stage in its manufacture or in its processing into finished articles can be shaped by flow."