Want a fork or spoon with your takeout? You’ll have to ask for it under a new Toronto bylaw

March 1, 2024 Canuck

If you need a plastic fork or spoon with your next takeout order, you’ll now have to make it clear, under a new city bylaw that took effect on Friday.

The single-use and takeway items bylaw requires restaurants to provide single-use takeout items only if they’ve asked the customer first or if the customer has asked for them. The items include utensils, straws, napkins, stir sticks, beverage takeout trays and condiment packages, and paper shopping bags except for certain types, such as bakery and prescription bags.

Under the bylaw, retail establishments must also allow customers to use their own reusable beverage cups and reusable shopping bags. Those establishments include not only brick-and-mortar stores and eateries, but also online businesses, street vendors and vending machines.

The “ask-first/by-request” move comes as the city begins the next phase of its strategy to reduce single-use items. The first phase was a voluntary program in which businesses were encouraged to take action to reduce excess waste.

Elyse Moriarty, general manager at Burgers ‘N Fries Forever in downtown Toronto, said the restaurant has already made some changes now mandated by the city. She said customers don’t ask for utensils for the most part. Still, she supports the bylaw.

“It’s definitely a good idea,” Moriarty told CBC Toronto on Friday. “At the end of the day, any little changes that we can do will be positive for the environment.”

Move doesn’t go far enough, says advocate

Emily Alfred, waste campaigner of the Toronto Environmental Alliance, said on Friday that the bylaw is a start but more action is needed.

“This regulation doesn’t go far enough. We think that this is just the first step of the strategy and the city needs to do a lot more,” Afred said.

Elyse Moriarty, general manager at Burgers 'N Fries Forever in downtown Toronto, says: 'It's definitely a good idea. At the end of the day, any little changes that we can do will be positive for the environment.' — Elyse Moriarty, general manager at Burgers ‘N Fries Forever in downtown Toronto, says: ‘At the end of the day, any little changes that we can do will be positive for the environment.’ (CBC)

For example, Alred said the alliance would like the city to regulate the use of reusable food items at large event venues.

But Alfred said the move is still progress.

On the organization’s website, Alfred wrote: “This is a big win for Toronto and a result of the hard work of so many community advocates and reuse champions pushing for change and showing what’s possible!”

Single-use items take energy to dispose of, city says

City staff have said the bylaw aims to eliminate the unnecessary use and disposal of the targeted single-use and takeaway items and to prevent them from becoming litter and entering the city’s waterways.

On its website, the city says: “Single-use and takeaway items require valuable resources and energy to produce, collect, process and dispose of.”

The rule does not apply to shelters, hospitals and medical facilities, places of worship and school nutrition programs.

Anyone who violates the bylaw may be fined no less than $500 and no more than $100,000.

The city recommends that residents do the following to reduce the use of single-use plastic or foam items and plastic-lined items labelled compostable or biodegradable: