One of the country's most successful businessmen is calling on the government to copy Britain and France and introduce a tax on new plastic.

It’s not an uncommon call, but the twist here is that the man making the call this time is Nick Mowbray – co-founder of toy manufacturer Zuru.

He told Heather du Plessis-Allan that if you look at the landscape, there is a big issue with single use plastics and there are bigger ways to fix the issue.

"I've always said that plastic isn't necessarily the problem, it's how we deal with it." 

He thinks banning plastic bags is just putting a plaster on the issue, and the economic playing field should be evened out.

Mowbray says that 'virgin' plastic should be more heavily taxed, and post-consumer or recycled plastics should be made cheaper. 

The tax would be placed on manufacturers rather than consumers, and Mowbray says that will be reflected in the prices. 

"The consumers got the option of buying the cheaper option. What is the manufacturer going to do then?"

He says that Zuru has removed a lot of the unnecessary packaging in their products to cut down on plastic use.