SUPERMARKET giant Morrisons has announced one of the most widely used plastics - expanded polystyrene – will be completely removed from all its food and drink products.

The store, which has branches in Chester, Ellesmere Port, Frodsham and Saltney, is making the move because polystyrene is not recyclable at kerbside services, lasts for hundreds of years and often gets easily blown away by the wind.

The move will prevent 600 tonnes of the material being disposed of every year.

Morrisons used polystyrene on its fresh food counters - for meat and fish trays - and as a base for instore-made pizzas.

It has also been used to package some delicate frozen desserts and cakes.

Approximately 90 million meat trays, fish trays and pizza bases were used in Morrisons last year.

The supermarket will instead introduce cardboard bases for pizzas and frozen goods. At its butchers and fishmongers clear recyclable plastic trays will be used – which are made from recycled plastic bottles.

Morrisons new more environmentally friendly packaging will also tell customers how it can be recycled. For example, the clear meat and fish trays feature the wording ‘rinse and recycle’ on the bottom.

Natasha Cook, Packaging Manager at Morrisons, said: “Polystyrene is a particularly difficult material to recycle – so we wanted to take it out of our products quickly.

"Taking plastic out of the environment remains one of our customers’ most pressing concerns so we continue to remove unnecessary plastic packaging or make it more recyclable.”

Expanded polystyrene is a packaging material incorporating plastic which has been injected with air - to make it lightweight.

However, as the plastic content is low, the material has little value to recyclers - and therefore has to date been incinerated or sent to landfill.

Morrisons has committed that by no later than 2025, all of its own-brand plastic packaging will be reusable, recyclable or compostable.