(Image source from: Sporteluxe)

Singapore uses at least 1.76 billion plastic items a year or about one plastic item per person per day - but less than 20 percent is recycled, according to survey results proclaimed by the Singapore Environment Council (SEC) on Tuesday.

In a survey of more than 1,000 people online, the non-governmental organization found that people in Singapore take about 820 million plastic bags yearly from supermarkets.

Only 2 percent of these supermarket plastic bags were recycled by consumers. Two-thirds were used for the disposal of waste.

The six-month SEC study, undertaken with the help of global consultancy Deloitte, besides found that Singapore used 467 million polyethylene terephthalate (PET) bottles a year and 473 million plastic disposable items like takeaway containers.

Less than 20 percent of these items are recycled.

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The study did not include plastic bags given out by places other than supermarkets.

A council spokesman said: "We wanted to measure something people could accurately recall and measure. Most people can estimate the number of plastic bags they use on each supermarket shopping trip, while it may be harder for them to recall how many bags they use from all sources in a week or month."

When asked about how this survey results contrast with previous estimates that Singapore goes through 13 plastic bags a day, SEC executive director Jen Teo said that the council's estimate was conservative.

"We wanted to be granular and focus on the most easily measurable usage," she said.

The SEC plans to launch a campaign to educate the public to use fewer plastic items and will work with partners such as NTUC FairPrice and Coca-Cola.

Teo said: "SEC is calling on every individual in Singapore to use one less plastic item per day. We intend to encourage shoppers to use not more than two plastic bags per trip. "

By Sowmya Sangam