Unilever secretly fought ban on plastic bags which it called ‘evil’ Business

The Unilever boss has publicly called for the phasing out of ‘evil’ plastic bags while the company has privately lobbied against their ban, it has been revealed.

Alan Jope, chief executive of the consumer goods giant, said the company “had to” stop using the sachets to pack small portions of soap, detergent and shampoo two years ago.

He echoed comments from another Unilever executive who called disposable packets “bad, because you can’t recycle them”.

Yet behind the scenes, the company privately lobbied against packaging bans that had been proposed in India, the Philippines and Sri Lanka, where they were contributing to mountains of plastic waste and pollution, according to Reuters.

The sachets, which are used to package Unilever products such as Sunlight soap, Sunsilk shampoo and Surf Excel laundry detergent, are said to account for 10% of the company’s global sales.

Following lobbying efforts by Unilever, India and the Philippines backed out of banning plastic packaging.

And while Sri Lanka continued its efforts, the country’s government later accused Unilever of trying to evade the ban on 6 milliliter sachets by presenting four packs as a single 24 milliliter unit.

Anil Jasinghe, secretary of Sri Lanka’s environment ministry, told Reuters: “Unilever tried to deceive us.”

Plastic bags have become commonplace in developing countries, where they are used to sell small portions of everyday products at low prices.