Tips for Retailers

Planet Ark is an Australian environmental group. These are simple but effective ideas for distributer-based education:

Tips for retailers to encourage the use of reusable bags
Planet Ark, Sydney, Australia

Inventor of the Dreaded Bag Passes Away

In the late 1970s, this North Carolina inventor developed the high-density plastic grocery bag. He helped make it the ubiquitous plague it is today. He must have recognized the problems at some point, because after he retired, Gordon Dancy started Phoenix Recycling, dedicated to recycling many of the plastic bags used in grocery stores:

Dec. 23, 2006
Myrtle Beach tinkerer dies
Kelly Marshall Fuller, The Sun News, Myrtle Beach, NC

A Myrtle Beach man who helped spread the phrase "paper or plastic" died Wednesday at Georgetown Memorial Hospital. Gordon Dancy, 67, who developed the high-density plastic grocery sack, spent his time improving items that would make the world run more smoothly, said his son, Mark Dancy...

Recycling Programs Failing in Greece

Greece's citizens resisted a plastax in 2005, but they are dealing with some big trash problems now:

12/23/06
Trash piles up as recycling fails
Kathimerini, Athens, Greece

The amount of rubbish produced per person in Greece has increased 43 percent to 440 kilos per year since 1995 with packaging waste – from food and consumer items – adding to household garbage, experts said yesterday. Most of the household rubbish ends up in any one of the 1,200 legal and illegal landfills that can be found across Greece...

2006 Positive Changes

Nov. 9, 2006
No More Plastic Bags - Action in Japan and Zanzibar
The Lazy Environmentalist blog, UK

Having long been a supporter of the highly successful 'plas tax' in Ireland (which has reduced plastic bag consumption by over 95%), and having written elsewhere at length on this issue, I was delighted to read yesterday not only of action in Japan, which comes hot on the heels of Zanzibar's decision to ban the import and production of plastic bags to protect its environment and tourism industry.

Where to Get Reusable Bags

Reusable bags seem to be hanging on every chair back and doorknob at my house, but some people might not be so lucky. Californians Against Waste has a website full of helpful info, including this list of places to get reusable bags:

How Do I Get a Reusable Bag?

Bye-bye Sili-silis!

New plastic bags (sili-silis) law kicks into effect in Sri Lanka. It ends with "it's time to pull out your old cane baskets or invest in some handy cloth bags the next time you go shopping":

12/31/06
Wish you a sili-sili-free New Year
Nadia Fazlulhaq, Sunday-Times, Columbo, Sri Lanka

Go to a supermarket today and you will, no doubt, come home with more than half a dozen sili-sili bags containing your purchases. Tomorrow, though, it may be a different story as Sri Lanka takes the significant step of doing away with thin polythene in the New Year...

New Laws in CA

Several plastic waste related bills have become since Jan. 1, including AB 2449:

12/31/2006
New environmental laws taking effect
The Times-Standard, Eureka, CA

California residents will notice changes next year as a result of new laws that will affect plastic bag recycling programs to larger fines against illegal dumping on private property...