Plastic: Not fantastic

by Jo-ann Hodgson in At home on 02.07.08

Kew Gardens became the latest in a growing number of places to ban plastic bags yesterday. But prohibiting the plastic isn’t the last word on greening up your shopping trip.

After Modbury in South Devon became the first British town to stop distributing plastic shopping bags last May, it seems the rest of the country has cottoned on to the idea of more environmentally-friendly alternatives.

Kings Langley in Watford went plastic bag-free earlier this year and the council of Chesham in Buckinghamshire recently spent £2,000 on biodegradable bags.

On the 1 June, China went a step further than countries such as the Republic of Ireland, which introduced a charge on plastic bags in 2002, and banned all retailers from handing out ultra-thin plastic bags.

Animal feed

An increase in public awareness of general environmental issues is surely partly behind the ‘ban the bag’ movement. But more specifically, it’s powerful images such as that of a Hawaiian Green Turtle swallowing a plastic bag that have made people act en masse. It was this image – part of a film by the BBC Natural History Unit on the plight of wildlife on the Hawaiian Islands – that apparently inspired the Modbury ban.

Greenpeace say that at least 267 marine species are known to have suffered from ingestion of marine debris such as plastic bags. It’s because plastic bags ‘photodegrade’ rather than biodegrade, breaking down into smaller and smaller parts that animals can confuse with food. It can take 500 to 1000 years for a plastic bag to break down completely.

Fashion fix

So how have such initiatives managed to prise plastic bags out of the hands of shoppers?

In Modbury, the local Co-operative supermarket kicked off proceedings by donating fairtrade, reusable cotton carriers to every household in the town.

Indeed, reusable ‘fashion’ bags have hit high street chains in a major way. Last year hundreds queued outside Sainsbury’s to get their hands on the limited edition cotton and rope design ‘I’m Not a Plastic Bag’ by Anya Hindmarch, which were apparently selling on eBay for up to £400. Marks and Spencer’s new designs, featuring the faces of campaign models such as Twiggy can be seen on the arm of many a Saturday shopper and most stores, from Boots to Tesco, now have their own take on the reusable carrier.

Paper bags are also becoming more common on our high streets, although the debate over how environmentally-friendly they are – considering the energy required to transport these heavier carriers – continues.

And I for one am not overly enthusiastic about carrying my shopping in US-style brown paper bags – how many times have you seen someone in a film drop their groceries all over the pavement, or ’sidewalk’, whilst using one of these? Although of course this scenario does often lead to some form of awkward but ultimately successful romance. Perhaps they’re not all bad.

Beware of the greenwash

However, there seem to be environmentally friendly alternatives to many everyday carrier dilemmas, from cornstarch food containers and food wrappers to biofloristry wrapping materials.

But as we noted last week, there’s a lot of greenwash about, and some companies may be looking to jump on the eco-carrier bandwagon without the bags to back it up. If you’re really going to get a buzz out your eco-friendly bag, consider whether the bag was made locally, whether the material used to make the bag is certified organic, fairtrade, natural and unbleached and whether any inks and dies used are vegetable-based.

IMAGE by Flickr user b.frahm’s