Thailand won’t be a dump, plastic-scrap imports face ban: PM

This will prevent Thailand from being perceived as the “garbage bin of the world”, Prayut said.

He made the statement in a Facebook post, a day after the Cabinet agreed to ban the import of plastic waste from 2025.

Under his leadership, the Natural Resources and Environment Ministry, Industry Ministry, Commerce Ministry, and Interior Ministry have worked together to draft a roadmap to ban the import of plastic waste, Prayut said.

If he is re-elected, his government will implement the roadmap, resulting in a total ban on the import of scrap plastic starting in 2025, he said.

The first phase of the policy has already been implemented. From 2019 to 2020, the government reduced the import of plastic waste to supply recycling plants outside special economic zones (SEZs). By September 2020, no plastic waste was imported for recycling plants outside SEZs.

In the second phase, from 2023-2024, imports of plastic waste will be restricted to 14 recycling plants for export in SEZs only.

From December 31, 2024, import of plastic scrap will be banned, he said.

Import of plastic scrap in 2023 and 2024 for the 14 recycling plants in SEZs will be limited to 372,994 tonnes for the first year and half that for the second year, he said.

Government agencies have been instructed to increase efforts to prevent plastic waste from being smuggled into the country, Prayut said.