Male’, Maldives – President of Maldives Ibrahim Mohamed Solih on Tuesday, has ratified the 18th Amendment Bill to the Export-Import Act (31/79) of Maldives.
The amendment was passed by the Parliament of Maldives at the 28th sitting of its third session, on 7th December 2020. Following the ratification of the act, import of any goods declared as single-use plastic by the President, will be prohibited under section 7 of the Act. It states that the President has the authority to compile and publicise a list of goods to be classified as single use plastic which will be banned under the act, and to add or remove items from that list. This will enable the Maldives to steadily phase out single-use plastic.
Im addition to this, the amendment mandates the Government to compile and publicise the temporary list of banned single-use plastics, including the date from which the changes will come into effect, before 1st January 2021, on the Government Gazette.
Following the ratification of the act by the President, the Act has been published in the Government Gazette. With the ratification, Section 12 of the 17th Amendment to the Export-Import Act (31/79) of Maldives has been rendered void.
