New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy has signaled his approval of a proposed statewide ban on plastic shopping bags, which has businesses gearing up for a fight.

About two dozen municipalities in New Jersey, including Hoboken, already have some form of plastic ban. But the bill making its way through the state legislature now would ban single-use plastic grocery bags, plastic straws, and Styrofoam containers, making it the most aggressive anti-plastic legislation in the country. 

Last summer, Gov. Murphy vetoed a bill that would've imposed a five-cent fee on plastic bags, calling it "incomplete and insufficient" in cutting back plastics use. 

"New Jersey is being hammered," Scott Fallon, who reports on the environment for NorthJersey.com, told WNYC. "85 percent of the litter that's been picked up on New Jersey's beaches is plastic."

The proposal comes as New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo is throwing his support behind a plastic bag ban. New Jersey's plan goes further by also imposing a ten-cent fee on paper shopping bags, with the goal of getting as many residents as possible to bring their own shopping bags to the grocery store.

Fallon said the bag ban would likely be taken up in Trenton later in 2019, after a minimum wage hike and marijuana legalization are settled. Meanwhile, grocery stores, gas stations and other businesses reliant on plastic bags are already recruiting lobbyists to fight the bill.

"They fear that if this is passed in New Jersey, other states will be emboldened to pass a similar measure, which would drastically hurt their business," Fallon said.

Fallon spoke with WNYC's Richard Hake.