SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA—TOMbag, an Australian social enterprise brings to the world an innovative and sustainable alternative to single-use plastic garbage bags. Made from discarded plastic bottles, TOMbag reusable garbage bags are 100 percent waterproof, easily washable and extremely durable. TOMbag reusable garbage bags are a perfect and one of a kind solution for the hospitality sector that is moving away from single-use plastics in their fight against climate change and global warming.
Sasha Pestano, Co-Founder of TOMbag, explains, “Single-use bin liners fly under the radar of society, but they are one of the major contributors to climate change. Globally, households use over 425 billion single-use plastic garbage bags every single year. This number excludes garbage bags discarded by commercial and industrial sectors. It’s a plastic pollution problem of a massive scale.”
TOMbag believes that current market offerings such as compostable and biodegradable garbage bags are not in line with sustainability principles and can’t offer scale in the long run. As per the recent report by Greenpeace and The Environmental Investigation Agency—Checking Out on Plastics II—any type of bioplastic is not sustainable as it draws resources from agricultural land that would otherwise feed the growing population. In addition, both types of bioplastic require special conditions to break down such as high temperatures over 50C/120F for biodegradables and special industrial composting facilities for compostables. And those are obviously not met when disposed in landfills. What is more, any type of compostable bioplastic releases methane when in landfill—a greenhouse gas much worse than carbon dioxide in how it affects global warming.
TOMbag sells their reusable products directly to consumers, but also to businesses including hotels and resorts. “We see a lot of synergy and common interests with the hospitality industry. Being aware of climate change and risks it poses to businesses, many big players in the hospitality sector are making enormous efforts to eliminate single-use plastics from all their operational activities. We believe that our unique offerings can help hotels with their goal to become plastic-free—if you want to replace single-use bin liners with a reusable and sustainable alternative we are your contact. Now, we have few big international hotel chains trialing our products and we believe it’s just the beginning,” concludes Pestano.
Recently, 61 leading tourism companies, business associations, suppliers, NGOs, consultancies and certification schemes announced their support of the Global Tourism Plastics Initiative and committed to transition from single-use plastics to reuse models.
