India shelves plan on countrywide ban on single-use plastic products

The plan was for Prime Minister Narendra Modi to outlaw six items on Wednesday, the 150th anniversary of the birth of independence leader Mahatma Gandhi, as part of a broader campaign to rid India of single-use plastics by 2022.

But it was seen as "too disruptive for industry", so instead:

For now, government will ask states to enforce existing rules against storing, manufacturing and using some single-use plastic products such as polythene bags and styrofoam ... "There is no new ban order being issued ... Now, it's a question of telling people about the ill-effects of plastic, of collecting and sending for for recycling so people don't litter."

Gandhi wept.

Pakistan is also experimenting with something similar. Ambitious effort, but without the infrastructural help to shift to alternatives that's just not going to happen