A Day Without Bags
Posted on Wednesday, December 19th, 2007 at 4:55 pmHeal the Bay is sponsoring A Day Without a Bag on December 20th in the Los Angeles area.
- More than 6 billion plastic bags are used in LA County each year. Because so few of them are recycled, the vast majority end up clogging precious landfill, littering public places and ultimately polluting our watersheds and oceans
- Disposable bags cost fiscally-strained LA County cities up to 17 cents per bag for disposal.
- Plastic bags are made from petroleum: Americans use over 380 billion bags every year, throwing away millions of barrels of oil.
With New Year approaching, we want all shoppers to make resolution to adopt more sustainable practices year round.
So, for those of you in LA (or anywhere for that matter), join us for a grassroots day of education and action. Challenge yourself as a holiday shopper by giving up single-use, plastic shopping bags for the day, in favor of reusable tote bags. Heal the Bay and all of the Reusable Bag Coalition partners are organizing a two-hour event at the Grove, with satellite operations within each of the four other Los Angeles County supervisorial districts (at participating retailers including all Ralphs and 99c Only locations). A press conference at the Grove and other locations (with celebrity and electeds involvement) will disseminate messages throughout the county. In addition, thousands of free, reusable bags will be given away to shoppers. For a list of locations go to www.healthebay.org/nobagday.
A Day Without a Bag is just one battlefront in the ongoing war against the scourge of plastic debris in our oceans and watersheds. It is primarily a vehicle for raising consumer awareness about personal choices — come and be a part of it if you can.
First, this campaign should extend to Canada! I have been using my own bags for many years. At first cashiers would look at me funny, then a few grocery stores began to offer 3-5 cents a bag if you brought your own. Now they give away reusable bags if you spend over a certain amount and I am seeing so many people in my small community in BC using them! It seems to be catching on!
posted on December 19th, 2007 at 7:13 pmHere in the UK Grocery Stores run a Bag For Life system whereby you purchace a plastic carrier bag (for around 10p) You then re-use this sturdier bag untill it fall apart at which point they replace it for free and recycle the remains of the old bio degradable bag. If your stores don’t have such a scheme then you should encourage them to introduce one. MZ
posted on December 20th, 2007 at 4:28 amI used Target’s festive red reusable totes as gift bags for Christmas. Everyone who received one was pleased and they only cost $1.49…less than a lot of bags made only to hold gifts and be thrown away.
You can see an image of the bags on my blog, on the December 23, 2007 entry.
posted on December 28th, 2007 at 12:27 pmI have really noticed the amount of plastic bags used in Sydney green grocers. Its shocking how one or two pieces of fruit and veg are put into a plastic bag in order to be weighed. Backward step to when brown paper bags were used, although bad not nearly as bad as what is happening now. There should be a surcharge for plastic bags used or given out and free recycling bags issued, so people think twice.
posted on January 1st, 2008 at 10:21 pm