My city Bangalore effectively enforced a plastic ban. So some grocery stores now only have paper bags even to pack veggies. I think it's doable. The government enforced the ban as there was no alternative, we don't have enough space for landfills.

A city like Singapore however uses a lot of plastic and thermocol. I wonder where they find space for their landfills. Probably they are doing the same, exporting all the trash to China or Indonesia.

China still accepts rare-earth/metal trash, but also properly sorted trash too. For example, recently mainland declined to accept Hong Kong trash until they implement sorting. On these conditions, they can continue sending their garbage to the mainland China.

That's the "reduce" part. But just how does one roll back packaging practices? I can't imagine how that would work.

Maybe the German model. But in the US? It seems unlikely.

What is the German model? I don’t recall there being a massive difference in packaging there except for the reusable (deposit required) soda bottles.

Extreme source separation. And laws that impose waste-management costs on manufacturers. See https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19411646 and https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19411250

Thanks. Will take a look at those.