Single use plastic bags to be banned.

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1059 posts

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#2071273 10-Aug-2018 13:20

scuwp:

Well intentioned, and I am not against the idea, but it won't make a jot of difference to the environment. NZ was never the problem when it came to ocean pollution with plastics, and people will just go out any buy plastic bags for bin liners, dog droppings, and everything else these 'multi-use' bags were used for so it will achieve absolutely zilch, other than create 'look at me' headlines for the politicians.

I agree.

And saw this the other day

https://www.theguardian.com/cities/gallery/2018/may/01/unexpected-beauty-china-bicycle-graveyards-share-bikes-in-pictures

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Kyanar

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#2071275 10-Aug-2018 13:21

The Queensland experience would tend to indicate supermarkets may need to invest in a temporary increase in security guards - we have literally had instances of checkout girls in tears while customers scream at them about why they are being charged 15c for thicker plastic bags.

Though New Zealanders are more used to it already what with Pak n Save having charged 10c a bag since forever.

kryptonjohn

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#2071276 10-Aug-2018 13:22

Pumpedd:

A serious question. I am old enough to remember what supermarkets packed in before plastic. It was brown sturdy paper bags. Sure, they wern't perfect but acceptable. Why are we not going back to them? They are surely far more environmentally friendly that reusable bags?

I have read that the reusable bags that are on offer are extremely unfriendly in terms of the environmental cost to make them.

I've read that paper bags have the same issue.

allio

883 posts

Ultimate Geek

#2071282 10-Aug-2018 13:25

scuwp:

Well intentioned, and I am not against the idea, but it won't make a jot of difference to the environment. NZ was never the problem when it came to ocean pollution with plastics, and people will just go out any buy plastic bags for bin liners, dog droppings, and everything else these 'multi-use' bags were used for so it will achieve absolutely zilch, other than create 'look at me' headlines for the politicians.

Of course you're right, but this attitude is missing the point a bit, isn't it? People say the same thing about about climate change. "NZ is a small country so nothing we do will make any difference on a global scale, so why should we change?" The way I see it, our role as a progressive small country is to show the rest of the world that it can be done. Because we're small, it is much easier for us to make this change than it is for the US, or India, or China. Why would those countries even try if the rest of the world hasn't? Imagine a politician in the US trying to gather support for real environmental change when even "clean, green New Zealand" hasn't done it. We can force their hands by leading by example.

peetter

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#2071284 10-Aug-2018 13:32

Lastman:
DarthKermit:

It's overall a good thing to ban them and reduce our overall use of plastic and plastic packaging. However to call them single use is actually inaccurate.

Using them again, for something like a bin liner, is more a convenience, surely. Why not just use the bin. Arguably more water might be used for cleaning, rinsing the bin but that can be incorporated with other washing.

I use supermarket bags all the time for number of different purposes that really can't be done by anything else than plastic. This is anyway just a marketing fad to make more money. As somebody already mentioned it is not West world or NZ that is the problem.

And as for the rubbish bins, it is cleaning the bins 2-3 times a week or cleaning it once in 3 months with plastic bag use, sorry but convenience will win any time.

Don't get me wrong, I recycle, use reusable flasks etc., but you can't and won't eliminate all plastic products. What you can do is make the disposal more effective.

vexxxboy

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#2071307 10-Aug-2018 13:53

kryptonjohn:

Pumpedd:

A serious question. I am old enough to remember what supermarkets packed in before plastic. It was brown sturdy paper bags. Sure, they wern't perfect but acceptable. Why are we not going back to them? They are surely far more environmentally friendly that reusable bags?

I have read that the reusable bags that are on offer are extremely unfriendly in terms of the environmental cost to make them.

I've read that paper bags have the same issue.

to negate the enviromental impact those cloth type reusable bags have to be used about 45 times

Common sense is not as common as you think.

MurrayM

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#2071310 10-Aug-2018 13:55

Sounddude:

If you haven't already, go out and buy these.

http://packingsorted.co.nz/

Worth their weight in gold.

I've seen those but wondered how they work in practice once you fill them up and get to the checkout. You start removing the items from the bags and the checkout operator starts scanning the items and then where does the scanned items go? Not back into the bags because they're still full of stuff that you're emptying out onto the conveyor belt. Or is the idea that you have to completely empty the bags out before the operator can start scanning the items and putting the items back into the bags (surely this would slow things down and be impractical for people that buy lots of stuff that couldn't all fit on the conveyor belt at once)?

Pumpedd

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#2071311 10-Aug-2018 13:55

The issue to me seems to have escaped our politicians who are using plastic bags to sidestep economic issues. Isnt the issue to get our manufactures to use less plastic in packaging our super market items?

I use all my supermarket bags twice, yet I see almost every pallet of goods in NZ is now wrapped in plastic. Bringing back glass milk bottles would be 1000 times more benefit to the NZ environment than banning plastic bags.

We currently have no plastic recycling system in NZ or Australia, and the mountains of plastic will soon have to be sent to land fill.

The issue is not so called single use plastic bags.

Dingbatt

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#2071312 10-Aug-2018 13:56

What brought this home to me was a holiday to Hawaii last year. Virtually everything we bought was supplied in a paper bag rather than plastic. And while I admit there is an environmental cost to producing paper bags, that is where the harm ends. Most of the higher quality tech items I have purchased recently have uniformly used cardboard and paper rather than plastic and styrofoam where possible. Virtue signalling, probably, but still making a difference.
I would like to see what constitutes 'single use' though.
As some have pointed out above, plastic bags are sometimes a necessary evil and very rarely only get used once. So perhaps a levy on bags that would both go to discourage use and fund cleanups would be more appropriate. Rather than supermarkets increasing their revenue through it.
The cause and effect of plastic pollution is much more tangible than climate change and as such should prove an easier sell.

“We’ve arranged a society based on science and technology, in which nobody understands anything about science technology. Carl Sagan 1996

MurrayM

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#2071316 10-Aug-2018 13:57

MikeB4:

We wrap "wet" rubbish in paper before putting it the bin. We also put a sheet of paper on the bottom of the bin. This is usually the weekly community newspaper. Time spent at sea in our boat showed us a few years back that we needed to change.

We don't get a community newspaper because we have a "No Junk Mail" sign on our letterbox in order to reduce paper waste... And I can't remember the last time I actually bought a real newspaper.

tdgeek

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#2071323 10-Aug-2018 14:05

I think its a waste of time. I read/heard somewhere that bugger all of our recycle bin stuff gets recycled. These plastic bags generally end up in the red bin so ho to a landfill, not waterways. Good ides, wrong plan.

We need to only use plastics that can be recycled here. Bottles all need to be recycled.

Pumpedd

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#2071326 10-Aug-2018 14:06

MurrayM:

MikeB4:

We wrap "wet" rubbish in paper before putting it the bin. We also put a sheet of paper on the bottom of the bin. This is usually the weekly community newspaper. Time spent at sea in our boat showed us a few years back that we needed to change.

We don't get a community newspaper because we have a "No Junk Mail" sign on our letterbox in order to reduce paper waste... And I can't remember the last time I actually bought a real newspaper.

Not many people have newsprint available anymore.

Maybe we should ban newspapers as well due to harmful environmental effect.

floydbloke

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#2071350 10-Aug-2018 14:16

Pumpedd:

...

Not many people have newsprint available anymore.

...

I guess we'll have to start wrapping our rubbish in the multitude of pamphlets that we receive each week from those same supermarkets.

Roses are red, that much is true, but violets are purple, not ****ing blue!

Sounddude

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#2071367 10-Aug-2018 14:36

MurrayM:

I've seen those but wondered how they work in practice once you fill them up and get to the checkout. You start removing the items from the bags and the checkout operator starts scanning the items and then where does the scanned items go? Not back into the bags because they're still full of stuff that you're emptying out onto the conveyor belt. Or is the idea that you have to completely empty the bags out before the operator can start scanning the items and putting the items back into the bags (surely this would slow things down and be impractical for people that buy lots of stuff that couldn't all fit on the conveyor belt at once)?

Store the bags in the back of the trolley so you re putting all your food directly into the trolley. When you get to the counter, put the bags into new trolley, set them up and get the goods loaded into them. (We use pack and save so it works very well).

Davy

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Master Geek

#2071372 10-Aug-2018 14:46

We lived for thousands of years without single-use plastic bags and bottles - I'm confident that we can survive without them.

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