The number of single-use plastic bags sold in England has risen by 7% in the past year, according to new data released by Defra.
The 102 retailers in England who report the data sold 437 million single-use carrier bags in the year to April, up from 407 million in the previous year.
Major supermarkets have driven much of that increase. Morrisons sold five million more single-use carrier bags, Sainsbury’s 2.5 million and the Co-op 1.3 million.
Morrisons said growth of online deliveries had pushed up the number of plastic bags sold, but the vast majority were returned and recycled.
“Over 50% of the postcodes we deliver to receive their groceries in a small crate which the customer unpacks and hands back to the driver on the doorstep,” a spokeswoman told The Grocer. “In the past six months, we have moved a further 12.5k of our customers to this bagless delivery system.
“The other postcodes are fulfilled by our automated central fulfilment centre, where our customers receive their groceries in a recyclable plastic bag – 88% of which are returned and recycled as part of a closed loop recycling process.”
Sainsbury’s said the increase over the past year had come from bags being used in on-demand sales through Deliveroo, Just Eat and Uber Eats and its own Chop Chop service.
“Our on-demand delivery services have grown in the last year and originally used single-use plastic bags,” a spokeswoman said. “We have replaced these with paper bags and expect our single-use plastic bag sales to reduce significantly in line with this, by the next report.”
Co-op said the bags it sells were not single-use plastic – despite Defra recording them as being so.
“As a responsible retailer, we do not sell single-use plastic bags or bags for life and haven’t done since 2021 when we converted all our carrier bags to be 100% certified compostable, with all profits from sales going to good causes,” a Co-op spokesperson said.
The retailer has previously argued that major retailers should be required to report on ‘bag for life’ sales too, given many shoppers “have simply traded up”.
Marks & Spencer and Asda saw decreases of approximately 7,000 and 55,000 bags respectively. Tesco and Waitrose have reported that they have not sold any single-use plastic carrier bags since 2022.
Sales have been trending downward since 2016, after laws were introduced requiring retailers to charge customers for all single-use carrier bags given out. Sales have only risen in one year since, when the legal obligation to charge was temporarily removed in 2020 in a move “to safeguard the health and safety of delivery drivers and the general public” during the Covid pandemic.
In that year the increase in bags sold was eight million on the previous year. This year it has risen by 30 million.
The total figure for the year to April 2025 is equivalent to around eight single-use plastic carrier bags per person in the UK. Supermarkets are the biggest sellers of single-use plastic carrier bags – Morrisons, Sainsbury’s, the Co-op, M&S and Asda accounting for 38% of the total bags sold by all retailers. Together those supermarkets sold the equivalent of three single-use bags to each person in the population in the past year.
The UK’s plastic bag levy was imposed initially on large retailers in October 2015, at 5p per bag. It was increased to 10p in May 2021 and expanded to all retailers with more than 250 employees.
Despite the latest increase, sales are down 79% since 2016 to 2017, the first full year of reporting since the single-use plastic carrier bag charge was introduced. Sales are down 88% since then among the seven main retailers.
Wrap had previously reported that the main retailers in England issued 7.6 billion single-use carrier bags in the calendar year 2014 – the equivalent to each person in the population using around 140 bags through the year.
“Our data indicates that, based on this year’s return, there has been a decrease of almost 98% in the annual number of single-use carrier bags sold by the main retailers (over 7.4 billion fewer bags) since the charge was introduced,” Defra said.
The government defines a single-use plastic bag as one that’s plastic and up to 70 microns thick, is new and has not already been used for sold goods to be taken away or delivered, and has handles, an opening and is not sealed. Plastic bags that are solely used for items like uncooked meat or flowers are exempt from the mandatory charge.
No comments yet