PARIS: Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo said on Friday the city planned to ban single-use plastic when it holds the 2024 Olympic Games as part of efforts to tackle a global plastic pollution crisis.

“We have decided to make the Olympic Games the first major major event without single-use plastic,” Hidalgo told a press conference at a session of the International Forum of Mayors against Plastic Pollution.

Visitors to temporary Olympics competition sites in the French capital will be admitted only without plastic bottles.

Coca-Cola, the American beverage giant and designated sponsor of the Paris Olympics, will distribute its products in re-usable glass bottles and more than 200 soda fountains, which will be redeployed after the games.

Re-usable cups will also be used for refreshments during the Olympics marathon.

“Plastic (waste) remains a major global issue: each year, 14,000 mammals and 1.4 million seabirds are killed due to the ingestion of plastic waste,” Hidalgo’s office said in a statement announcing the Olympics single-use plastic ban Organisers of the Paris Olympics have said they want to halve the carbon footprint compared to previous Summer Games in Rio in 2016 and London in 2012. The Tokyo Olympics last year took place behind closed doors due to the Covid pandemic.

The U.N. Environment Programme issued a report on May 16 saying countries could reduce plastic pollution by 80% by 2040 using existing technologies and making major policy changes.

Published in Dawn, May 27TH, 2023