Since my country officially banned the import of plastic waste on January 1 this year, many people have been paying attention to the impact of China's ban on Western countries. The media is also paying attention to the mountains of garbage in garbage recycling plants in the United States and the United Kingdom, but few people pay attention to domestic plastics. The situation of garbage importing enterprises, the current living conditions of these enterprises is worth thinking about.

In July 2017, my country officially notified the WTO that in order to strengthen environmental protection, my country will officially ban the import of waste plastics on January 1, 2018. Once the news was released, people applauded and supported the government's decision. But the ban is a bolt from the blue for plastic waste importing companies.

Before June 2017, there were more than 1,000 businesses engaged in waste plastics in Qijiao Industrial Park and Mailin Industrial Park in Xingtan Town, Guangdong Province. The waste plastics of these businesses come from all over the world, and waste plastics from Japan, the United States, the United Kingdom and other countries can be seen here. After the ban was promulgated, there were only a handful of businesses here, and many businesses' plastic import sources were banned. By the beginning of 2018, all the businesses engaged in imported plastics in these two industrial parks had ceased production, the factories were closed and the factories were vacant, and the revelation of "factory rental" was posted everywhere.

Not only Xinglin Town, but also Zhaogezhuang Town, Wen'an County, Hebei, Liuguanzhuang Town, Ju County, Shandong, and Xinqiao Town, Taizhou, Zhejiang, businesses and family workshops in these places, either affected by the ban or reviewed by the environmental protection department, have been successively Shut down or switch to another business.

It has been three months since the ban was implemented. How is the survival of the relevant companies? How are these companies doing in the face of the ban?

For some small family workshops or small enterprises with a single source of raw materials, they are almost in a state of "death". Because these small enterprises and workshops have a single supply of goods, and the domestic plastic recycling system is not perfect, they are unable to develop new sources of supply, and they have to stop production and close their doors in the face of the ban. Those strong and large-scale enterprises generally have the following directions.

Make full use of the recycling system of domestic plastic waste. According to a company in Suzhou, although my country's plastic recycling system is not perfect, the company has cooperated with some garbage recyclers in the Suzhou area to deepen the local plastic recycling system. At present, the company's main source of plastics has turned to domestic. Even if the import of waste plastics from abroad is banned, the impact on the company has been minimal, and the source of plastic waste in the domestic market can fully meet the company's raw material needs.

Move the production plant to Southeast Asia or other regions. China's ban will inevitably lead to the flow of waste plastics to other countries, of which Southeast Asia is a very important flow. Many manufacturers choose to relocate their factories to Southeast Asia. In Xingtan Town, Guangdong, mentioned above, there are still recruitment notices in the industrial park, but the factory has been relocated to a new work location - Vietnam. Southeast Asian countries will not sit idly by in the face of plastic waste, and relocating factories can only be a temporary relief.

The plastic waste is deeply processed at the source of imports, and then enters my country after meeting domestic standards. China bans plastic waste mainly because plastic waste seriously pollutes the environment. Deep processing of plastic waste abroad before entering China will not cause pollution to the domestic environment, but also avoid factory relocation. This method is a good choice for those businesses that are strong.

No matter which method these plastic recycling companies take, the ban will be a pain in the ass for these companies. However, this period of pain will not only re-deploy the plastic recycling industry and fully tap the domestic market, but also promote the construction and upgrading of my country's plastic recycling system, and promote the development of domestic environmental protection. From the current stage, the ban will cause shocks in the domestic plastics industry to a certain extent; but from a long-term perspective, the ban will do more good than harm to the plastics industry. The big waves wash away the sand, and the only thing left is gold.