Federal Plastics Ban

The Government of Canada took a major step towards finalizing its proposed ban on non-essential single-use plastics by the end of 2021. On May 12, 2021, it published the final Order Adding a Toxic Substance to Schedule 1 to the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, 1999, in order to designate "plastic manufactured items" as "toxic" under Schedule 1 of the Act.

This step enables the federal government to propose risk management measures to prevent plastic pollution, including regulating the quantity of plastic items produced in Canada, and how these products are to be processed, exported, stored, transported, and packaged. These measures may also include an extended producer responsibility policy.