Seventy million plastic bags end up in the trash in Iceland every year, according to a report from the Ministry for the Environment.
Kjartan Ingvarsson, lawyer at the Ministry for the Environment, highlighted in an interview with ruv.is that some plastics contain harmful substances which can affect the surrounding biosphere.
He said that the government must adopt measures to reduce the use of plastic bags in the country, either through increased tax collection or a partial ban or restrictions on plastic bag usage.
If the bags used in Iceland each year were laid out on the ground, they would cover 14 square kilometers.
The towns of Hafnarfjörður and Garðabær have decided to take measures to reduce plastic bag usage by, for example, providing residents with reusable bags.
Plastic bags take hundreds of years to break down.
