Plastic-free holidays aboard the Mein Schiff fleet: This is the vision underlying the plastic reduction programme launched by TUI Cruises last autumn. The results delivered in the first year of the WASTELESS programme are impressive: As many as 30 million plastic items per year are now saved aboard the Mein Schiff fleet. TUI Cruises is planning to eliminate all plastic and other single-use products or replace them with alternative products made from renewable or sustainable raw materials by the end of 2020. The objective of the programme is to actively contribute to the fight against the rising tide of plastic waste.
The cruise line has implemented measures in all areas on board its ships – in particular the hotel and hospitality areas. Passengers are offered straws made from sugar cane or glass and wooden cocktail stirrers, while plastic cocktail sticks have been eliminated. Morning newspapers ordered by passengers are no longer delivered to the cabin door in a plastic wrapping, but hung on the door handle with recyclable hemp string. In the ships’ shops, all plastic bags have been eliminated and replaced with Mein Schiff beach bags made from recycled PET or recyclable Mein Schiff jute bags. A key measure massively increasing the number of plastic items eliminated was implemented aboard the ships this summer: thanks to the launch of butter dispensers across the fleet, packaging from ten million single-portions will be removed in future.