SHOPPERS in Mold joined communities across the UK to participate in a nationwide ‘Mass Unwrap’ event.

Organised as part of the Surfers Against Sewage Plastic Free Communities campaign, a Mass Unwrap aims to highlight how much of what shoppers buy is wrapped in unnecessary plastic packaging.

Around 50 Lidl shoppers joined in with the event - which took place on Saturday, February 22 - to leave behind almost 200 items of unnecessary single use plastic packaging from their shopping, with 80 per cent of it removed from fruit and vegetables.

Bethan Maria Williams said: “People are not thinking about the impact on the environment, but doing this at Lidl today is drawing attention to the amount of plastic that we come across every day.

"Businesses need to change their way of thinking too to reduce the amount of plastic they use.”

Andrew Parkhurst said: “There is so much plastic, as a family we recycle everything, yet our bin is still full of the stuff, it never used to be like this.”

Margaret and Emilio Navarro were buying products in bulk and said: “It’s better to buy in bulk as there is just one plastic wrap, rather than buying just a couple every week, with multiple plastic wraps.”

The event was supported by Smurfit Kappa who provided cardboard boxes for shoppers to pack their unwrapped produce into.

Rhian Clark from Smurfit Kappa was on hand to help shoppers unwrap their goods and said: “Mark Hughes, our sales director, and I were delighted to get involved in this event.

"Smurfit Kappa are working hard to reduce their environmental impact throughout the business and we have taken action at our Mold site to eliminate single use plastics such as plastic cutlery, cups, and single use plastic bottles by issuing all the workforce with new drinks bottles to top up at the provided water fountains.

"As a business our ambition is to where appropriate design and produce paper based alternatives to plastic packaging.”

Shannon Jones of Mold Plastic Reduction said: “It has been great to see so many shoppers getting involved and leaving their unnecessary plastic behind.

"Lidl have been really supportive of this event and are recycling as much of the plastic we removed as possible.”

Mold Plastic Reduction is to hold a public meeting on March 12 at St Davids Church Hall from 7pm to 9pm to review what they’ve achieved since forming the group, as well as to involve the community in planning the targets for 2020 and beyond.

The meeting will also review the Welsh Assembly Government consultation on making Wales a Circular Economy which includes targets to eliminate unnecessary, highly littered single use plastic.

Anyone who wishes to find out more can email moldplasticreduction@gmail.com or search on Facebook for @Plastic Reduction Mold - Lleihau Plastig Yr Wyddgrug, Twitter: @MoldReduction or Instagram: @plasticreductionmold.