By Philippine News Agency BAYAMBANG, Pangasinan -- The municipal government of this town will start banning the use of plastic cellophane, sando bags and styrofoam this July. Raymundo Bautista Jr., chief of staff and legal officer of the municipality, in an interview on Tuesday, said they have already given an ample amount of time for vendors and business establishments in the town to comply with the municipal plastic ban ordinance. He said Municipal Ordinance No. 19 regulating the use of plastic cellophane and sando bags as packaging materials and utilization of styrofoam (polystyrene) for food and beverages containers in the municipality of Bayambang was approved in September last year. “Violators will be fined with PHP500 and eight hours community service (first offense); PHP1,000 and 12 hours community service (second offense); PHP1,500 and criminal prosecution (third offense),” he added. Bautista said the ordinance has been adopted from the Republic Act (RA) 9003, or the Ecological Solid Waste Management Act of 2000. “We have already met with the vendors at the town’s public market, business establishments and even with the fast food restaurants here and ask them to use bottles or containers for liquid products, paper bags and biodegradable plastics, but not sando bags or cellophane bags and styrofoam,” he said. The town’s Task Force Basura, as well as policemen and personnel of the Public Order and Safety Office deputized by the Solid Waste Management Office here, will strictly monitor the compliance to this ordinance, he added. Apart from compliance with RA 9003, Bautista underscored the need to implement the plastic ban to address the increasing volume of wastes in the town. “We need to manage waste disposal in our town as we are producing ten tons of garbage every week and we pay to the Urdaneta City government for the use of their engineered sanitary landfill to dump our wastes,” he said. Aside from the plastic ban, the municipality also applies the “no segregation, no collection of garbage” in the 11 urban barangays here, Bautista said, noting this policy will soon be undertaken in other barangays. He disclosed they plan to set up a total of nine material recovery facilities (MRF) in addition to the existing MRF situated at barangay Dusuc. “We hope to reduce plastic wastes in our town,” said Bautista.