Saturday, October 09, 2004

Americans are noticing the harm plastic bags are doing

Time was when we all worried about it, the Irish, the Scots, the South Africans, the Australians, us Indians… but the Americans didn’t.

Everyone else’s worrying and all the clean-up action lost meaning because it’s the Americans who consume most of the stuff on earth, and use – and throw away the most plastic bags too.

So, seeing this article in Newsday gave me great joy. That’s one thing I love about the Americans. Once they pick up a cause, they run with it with an energy and intensity that no one else on earth can match. If the Americans cotton on to this cause, we’re home free!












“We are drowning in plastic bags around here. They obviously reproduce exponentially in the closet at night. Take a look at a typical day in our household.

Monday: Pick up a few things at a local farm stand - scallions, lettuce, green beans. That's three plastic bags, but since I have a tote bag I don't need a fourth bag for the other three. "Vanity Fair" arrives in the mail in a plastic casing. My husband comes back from the post office with a ton of mail in a plastic bag. Buy chicken at the supermarket, think about asking for paper but contemplate the chicken juices leaking all over the car, and, whoops, said chicken is in a plastic bag before I get my change. And the morning paper arrived in a plastic bag. Total for the day: seven. Saved: one.

And goes the week. Plasticbagitis is an epidemic sweeping the world, and it's happening right here in my home. This is not a good thing. Spend a few minutes on line and you discover that this plastic-bag epidemic is not only totally terrible for the environment, but completely out of control.

Thousands of turtles, birds and other marine animals are killed every year because they swallow the darn things, mistaking them for squid and jellyfish....

Sad, when solutions exist. Economical and attractive solutions: See the reusable bags at www.badlani.com/bags/

What do you think? Am I being practical here? Or do you believe that there's another solution?

Read the rest of the article hereMore...

Tuesday, October 05, 2004

Know why Russians bring their own shopping bags?

Because stores in Russia don't give away free plastic shopping bags, that's why. That's why the Irish government imposed a tax on plastic shopping bags and reduced usage 90%.









The folks who run our convoluted world can’t accept that there are simple solutions to seemingly complex problems. With one fell swoop we can stop our earth from being choked at the rate of one million plastic bags being thrown away every minute!

What do we have to do? Do we need a heavy think tank to figure this one out? No. Just tax plastic bags, and viola! – we’ll have a nicer world!
What a delight to find a like minded soul

Its nice to know that there are like minded folks out there. I just read a weblog from a guy called Josh Dorfman who runs an online lifestyle company called Vivavi.com.











He has concerns about the same things that bother me and I’m going to write to him hoping we can work together in some way soon. Be nice to actually syndicate with a whole bunch of like minded business folk. Read his blog. Its at http://vivavi.com/Vivavi_Daily.php