Hardly a day goes by, it seems, without someone proposing a ban or fee on plastic bags or calling the industry out for making a product that, when it is littered, is an eyesore with the potential to harm marine life.
Despite a modest increase of 2.23 percent in the volume of plastic film and bags recycled in 2007, it is important to keep momentum going with specific recycling initiatives, said Nina Bellucci Butler, a project manager at Moore Recycling Associates Inc.
Many Plans to Curtail Use of Plastic Bags, but Not Much Action
NEW YORK TIMES February 23, 2009
Regarded by some as a symbol of consumer culture wastefulness, plastic bags have been blamed for street litter, ocean pollution and carbon emissions produced by manufacturing and shipping them. Momentum for imposing fees or bans has expanded from a few, often affluent, liberal cities on the West Coast — San Francisco was the first big city to ban plastic bags, in 2007 — to dozens of legislative proposals in states like Connecticut, Maryland, Massachusetts, Texas and Virginia. Yet as support increased in places, the national economy began to decline. No state has imposed a fee or a ban.
Mexico’s second largest supermarket chain claims it is the country’s first mass retailer to replace plastic shopping bags with biodegradable polyethylene ones at all its stores.Organización Soriana SAB de CV, a public company headquartered in Monterrey, introduced the T-shirt bags to its 464 stores in January and February. The move preempts the imminent introduction of new federal and state laws prohibiting the use of non-biodegradable plastic bags in Mexico. Proposed legislation that would ban them has been under consideration by lawmakers for several months and the plastics industry community expects it to become law soon.
The South Australian provincial government has stepped up its campaign to encourage consumers to reject lightweight polyethylene shopping bags as it moves towards a ban on their use by May.
The flurry of anti-plastic activity at the state level is already in full force in 2009, not diminished at all by state budget deficits in California and elsewhere.
UK Supermarkets on Track for Greater Bag Reduction
PLASTICS AND RUBBER WEEKLY December 19, 2008
A new target has been agreed between major UK supermarket chains and the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) in the continuing drive to cut the number of free plastic shopping bags.
Rules Changing for Plastic Bags, Regulator Advises
PLASTICS NEWS December 9, 2008
Extruders of plastic bags may need to change the way they do business, according to California state regulator Gary Petersen, who suggests reusable bags are the wave of the future.
Tax hikes are in da bag. Facing alarming budget deficits, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg has come up with some unusual ways to save money and cut costs: Steeper fees for red-carpet events. Higher parking meter rates. Cheaper reflective traffic signs instead of lighted versions. And a nickel fee for every chintzy plastic bag you get at the supermarket. Officials say it would keep tons of plastic bags from clogging up landfills -- and raise about $16 million for the city coffers.
Question: What was the hottest accessory in the United States in the past year? Jewelry? Designer handbags? Oversized sunglasses?
Answer: None of the above.
It was reusable shopping bags, sales of which jumped 72 percent from May 2007 through May 2008, according to consumer and retail information company the NPD Group. The bags are at once practical, eco-friendly and trendy, and they're as likely to be seen on the arms
Seattle has become the first major U.S. city to place a tax on plastic bags, and has also enacted a ban on polystyrene containers for businesses that serve food.
Plastic bag tax initiatives in Los Angeles, Seattle and in the California Legislature are threatening to trigger fees that effectively would ban plastic carryout bags at large retailers. Also at stake is an unraveling of the momentum the industry has built in the past year for mandated at-store recycling as an alternative to bans or fees.
Manhattan Beach has banned the use of petroleum- based and bio-based plastic carryout bags, and Rhode Island and New York have bills awaiting governors’ signatures, which would make them the second and third states to mandate plastic bag recycling at larger retailers.
Bans Force Grocers, Bag Makers to Rethink the Plastic Bag
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS January 23, 2008
The inevitable question faced by shoppers at the grocery checkout, how to tote their food home, may soon get simpler. Faced with a growing push in some states and cities to ban or limit use of plastic bags, many grocers are encouraging consumers to recycle bags or bring their own. At least one, Whole Foods Market Inc., plans to do away with the bags altogether.
The London Councils organisation looks set to recommend the UK government imposes a ban or a levy on plastic shopping bags in the capital, following a public consultation.
