-- "I only speak the truth"
Karma: null(Mostly affected by an unassigned variable)
Not banned...
by
quandrum
·
· Score: 5, Informative
if anyone had RTFA, they are banning bags of less then 30 *MICRONS* thickness. (The current bags are 17) Of course the consumer gets the to pay the cost of that extra.01 gram of plastic
"if anyone had RTFA, they are banning bags of less then 30 *MICRONS* thickness. (The current bags are 17)"
Makes you wonder why Slashdot Submitters feel the need to sensationalize their stories. There must be aspirations to work for CNN. "Hi Mom. My description of a story is in print!"
plastic or paper?
by
Bowling+Moses
·
· Score: 4, Insightful
I can see how they want to get rid of the unsightliness of plastic bags blowing around everywhere, but this solution may be flawed. In a book I read on University of Arizona's famed garbology project (official website here), plastic has some advantages over paper. Easier to recycle, compresses better, and in a sanitary landfill, well, decomposition's bad. You'd prefer it to dessicate and sit there more or less inert and stable. The only landfill where there's much decomposition is going on is at Fresh Kills landfill in New York, conveniently located on the coast so it stays wet and the tides agitate the toxic sludge. However the problem facing South Africa looks like its going after is a litter problem, which maybe could be better fixed by building up the infrastructure to handle the garbage problem. While that may be a better, more permanent solution its also harder and more expensive to implement. Although it does remind me of one of Iraq's current problems, that being piles of trash that haven't been picked up in months and are still a low priority. Too bad it's also a recipe for a cholera epidemic.
On a serious note, here in the US we use those bags for everything. Then we stuff them in a drawer or next to the fridge and reuse them much of the time. You don't see them littering our streets much at all. If South Africans feel it's okay to litter these bags everywhere, then they'll feel fine about littering other things too. The law might help a little, but you can't clean up your town or country without first cleaning up the prevailing attitude about littering.
For an example check out American Samoa. The whole island looks like New Orleans after Mardi Gras. Trash everywhere. You can't drive down a road without the car in front of you tossing crap out the window. It's disgusting. If you ask about it the locals just smirk like you're the foolish one... Hey the storms and ocean eventually wash everything away right? How silly to actually collect it and put it somewhere out of sight! A strong littering law there would certainly generate some cash for the government, but it would be even worse than speed limits here; no one would really believe in it, and no one would really follow it.
First they would have to do a huge public awareness campaign and market cleanliness as COOL and responsible, and market littering as ignorant and old-fashioned. They'd have to teach school children to yell at their parents (like they do here about smoking), and give awards to clean-up crews. Then the law would MEAN something, other than fine revenue for the state.
--
Operator, give me the number for 911!
my local coop...
by
an_mo
·
· Score: 3, Interesting
has posted information with reasons why they are advocating the use of plastic bags instead of the standard paper bags. It claims plastic bags are much more environment friendly, for example it takes 6 truckloads of paper bags to deliver one equivalent truckload of plastic bags. Reusability is also an issue with paper bags.
Ireland Charges for plastic bags
by
Celt
·
· Score: 3, Interesting
Best they we ever did, 15c for every carrier bag given out.
The country is a cleaner place now. I think every country should follow us, (UK take note)
-- "WebTV: bringing the Internet into the shallow end of the gene pool since 1995" - Martin Bishop
I have a question
by
ApharmdB
·
· Score: 3, Interesting
Why doesn't your local co-op advocate the use of resuable bags? I bought 3 mesh bags about 4 years ago and they have done their job well this whole time. They ball up small, and I just keep them in my car so that I don't forget them. Also, they can hold a lot if you can carry it. I finally broke the handle on one once by putting 5 half-gallons of milk and juice into it. I just sewer the handle back on. I've probably saved hundreds of bags over the last 4 years of grocery shopping by doing so.
The best plastic bag story ever!
by
Otter
·
· Score: 4, Funny
(I'm pretty certain the site I plagiarized this from plagiarized it from the Wall Street Journal. I read it there, in essentially this form.)
Back in 1990, pet-store owner Stuart Thomson ordered new plastic bags for his store in Glasgow, Scotland. Within weeks, a stack of flimsy white sacks stamped with a red parrot and his Pet Shop's address showed up on his doorstep.
Mr. Thomson didn't give the matter any more thought until a letter arrived years later from a German trekker reporting odd tales from the sun-scorched bazaars of Central Asia. That was only the beginning. One by one, youthful backpackers, European diplomats and rugged mountain climbers started turning up at his shop like disciples, guided by the address on a plastic bag.
None had any interest in cat litter, poodles or aquariums. They had come to Glasgow in search of an answer to a mystery they had encountered on their travels thousands of miles away: Why, from the blue-tiled mosques of Uzbekistan to the hairpin turns of the mountainous Karakoram Highway, were so many people carrying bags adorned with Mr. Thomson's red parrot?
Border guards in Pakistan use them to hold their lunch. Kyrgyz shoppers stuff them with pickled fish, speckled rice and malodorous meat. Camels once traversed the sandy paths of Central Asia's legendary trade route, the Silk Road. But today's traders think nothing of carrying their wares in a Scottish parrot sack.
Without knowing it, Mr. Thomson had turned his cramped pet shop into one of the best-known brand names in Central Asia. In this age of global capitalism, the parrot sack is a bizarre mutation, a peculiar byproduct of the big bang that has led the planet's most diverse peoples and cultures to be united by nothing more substantial than the Nike swoosh, the Golden Arches or Mr. Thomson's red bird.
"I was really flummoxed at the beginning," the pet salesman says, adjusting his spectacles as an employee vacuums birdseed from the rug. Soon after the German wrote, a group of merry Scots having a dinner party in western China rang up. "We'd be happy if you'd settle an argument," they giggled into the phone. "How did these bags come to be here?"
Good question. A reconnaissance mission to the tiny, mountainous republic of Kyrgyzstan suggests western China itself is the source of all that is plastic and parrot-festooned. The traders bringing the bags here are Uighurs, the Muslim minority group from China's restive desert region of Xinjiang. They sell their wares at a giant, muddy market in the Kyrgyz capital of Bishkek, lunching on dumplings and noodles as shoppers paw through brightly colored fabrics, stacks of buckets and rows and rows of parrot bags.
"We don't talk to journalists," one mutters in broken Russian when asked about the bags, disappearing into a metal hut before his picture can be snapped.
These secretive agents, Mr. Thomson believes, buy the bags from a giant plastics factory in Urumqi, the capital of Xinjiang. The plant prints about 150,000 bags for the pet shop a year and churns out millions of variations on the side for extra profit, he says, adding that some of his business associates suggested to him that the sacks may be part of an elaborate scheme to milk subsidies from the Chinese government. "The machines are going 24 hours a day, I'm told," he says.
Mr. Thomson's sacks carry the classic design -- a red parrot on a white bag with the address 992 Pollokshaws Road, Glasgow. Most of the bags in Central Asia once copied the same motif, only on a yellow sack. But a stroll through the Alamadeen food market in Bishkek shows the parrot has begun to mutate wildly. One knockoff boasts two red parrots, the wrong address on Pollokshaws Road and, oddly, the words "More, More, More!" Another shows two red robins clearly inspired by the parrot and the message "The Plastic Bag Shop. Welcome Patronage."
Mr. Thomson can't fathom why his parrot became the subject of such admiration. He's too busy with squawking birds and barking dogs to get to
Re:The best plastic bag story ever!
by
Svartalf
·
· Score: 3, Funny
As for the real live macaw that inspired the original bags, it never lived to see its name in lights, Mr. Thomson says: "I came in one day, and he was dead."
...It's an ex-parrot...
(Sorry, had to be said...:-)
-- I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
Slashdot's No Fun Anymore
by
fm6
·
· Score: 4, Insightful
Are all the editors too busy playing The Sims to actually read the articles before posting them? South Africa hasn't banned all plastic bags, or even most of them. They've only banned plastic shopping bags. And not even all of those -- just the super-thin ones that aren't worth recycling.
Which sounds pretty sensible to me. If these bags had even a tiny monetary value, they'd soon be scavanged up by SA's huge impoverished underclass. By forcing merchants to use recyclable bags, the solve an ecological problem and inject a little money into the lower economy too.
Western Alaska Banned Them Too
by
core+plexus
·
· Score: 3, Interesting
"Outside the Western Alaska village of Emmonak, white plastic shopping bags used to start appearing 15 miles from town. They blew out of the dump and rolled across the tundra like tumbleweeds. In Galena, they snagged in the trees and drifted into the Yukon River. Outside Kotlik, on the Yukon Delta, bags were found tangled around salmon and seals.
No more. All three villages banned the bags."
Re:punish those that litter?
by
fm6
·
· Score: 3, Funny
Sorry guy, S&M is still recreation, not employment!
Re:There's recycled and repolymerized
by
ichimunki
·
· Score: 3, Insightful
"Paper or plastic" is a false dichotomy. The best shopping bags are made of cloth. Natural fiber cloth bags can last a very long time-- obviating the need for single or limited use bags. And waste reduction (through reuse) is far more important than any level of recyclability. Natural fiber cloth bags can also theoretically be recycled into paper.
-- I do not have a signature
The reason behind the new law
by
eugene_roux
·
· Score: 3, Interesting
Local testing here in South Africa found that the 17micron bags were very difficult to near impossible to recycle.
Between the thinness of the bags and the ink used on the plastic bags by the shops and supermarkets, attempts of recycling the bags just caused the plastic to be contaminated beyond use.
Additionally the 30micron bags, beyond merely being easier to recycle, will also encourage reuse, since the amounts paid by the consumers out of their own pockets, while certainly not excessive, are quite noticible to the majority of South Africans.
It had been observed that people tend to value what they pay for somewhat more than that which they receive for free...
-- Part Time Philosopher, Oft Times Romantic, Full Time Unix Geek
Slashdot Mirror
I better dump my stash in this nearby ravine.
"I only speak the truth"
Karma: null(Mostly affected by an unassigned variable)
if anyone had RTFA, they are banning bags of less then 30 *MICRONS* thickness. (The current bags are 17) Of course the consumer gets the to pay the cost of that extra .01 gram of plastic
Pity the men whose small sacks are now illegal...
I can see how they want to get rid of the unsightliness of plastic bags blowing around everywhere, but this solution may be flawed. In a book I read on University of Arizona's famed garbology project (official website here), plastic has some advantages over paper. Easier to recycle, compresses better, and in a sanitary landfill, well, decomposition's bad. You'd prefer it to dessicate and sit there more or less inert and stable. The only landfill where there's much decomposition is going on is at Fresh Kills landfill in New York, conveniently located on the coast so it stays wet and the tides agitate the toxic sludge. However the problem facing South Africa looks like its going after is a litter problem, which maybe could be better fixed by building up the infrastructure to handle the garbage problem. While that may be a better, more permanent solution its also harder and more expensive to implement. Although it does remind me of one of Iraq's current problems, that being piles of trash that haven't been picked up in months and are still a low priority. Too bad it's also a recipe for a cholera epidemic.
now only criminals will use.. ah forget it.
On a serious note, here in the US we use those bags for everything. Then we stuff them in a drawer or next to the fridge and reuse them much of the time. You don't see them littering our streets much at all. If South Africans feel it's okay to litter these bags everywhere, then they'll feel fine about littering other things too. The law might help a little, but you can't clean up your town or country without first cleaning up the prevailing attitude about littering.
For an example check out American Samoa. The whole island looks like New Orleans after Mardi Gras. Trash everywhere. You can't drive down a road without the car in front of you tossing crap out the window. It's disgusting. If you ask about it the locals just smirk like you're the foolish one... Hey the storms and ocean eventually wash everything away right? How silly to actually collect it and put it somewhere out of sight! A strong littering law there would certainly generate some cash for the government, but it would be even worse than speed limits here; no one would really believe in it, and no one would really follow it.
First they would have to do a huge public awareness campaign and market cleanliness as COOL and responsible, and market littering as ignorant and old-fashioned. They'd have to teach school children to yell at their parents (like they do here about smoking), and give awards to clean-up crews. Then the law would MEAN something, other than fine revenue for the state.
Operator, give me the number for 911!
has posted information with reasons why they are advocating the use of plastic bags instead of the standard paper bags. It claims plastic bags are much more environment friendly, for example it takes 6 truckloads of paper bags to deliver one equivalent truckload of plastic bags. Reusability is also an issue with paper bags.
Best they we ever did, 15c for every carrier bag given out.
The country is a cleaner place now.
I think every country should follow us, (UK take note)
"WebTV: bringing the Internet into the shallow end of the gene pool since 1995" - Martin Bishop
Why doesn't your local co-op advocate the use of resuable bags? I bought 3 mesh bags about 4 years ago and they have done their job well this whole time. They ball up small, and I just keep them in my car so that I don't forget them. Also, they can hold a lot if you can carry it. I finally broke the handle on one once by putting 5 half-gallons of milk and juice into it. I just sewer the handle back on. I've probably saved hundreds of bags over the last 4 years of grocery shopping by doing so.
(I'm pretty certain the site I plagiarized this from plagiarized it from the Wall Street Journal. I read it there, in essentially this form.)
Back in 1990, pet-store owner Stuart Thomson ordered new plastic bags for his store in Glasgow, Scotland. Within weeks, a stack of flimsy white sacks stamped with a red parrot and his Pet Shop's address showed up on his doorstep.
Mr. Thomson didn't give the matter any more thought until a letter arrived years later from a German trekker reporting odd tales from the sun-scorched bazaars of Central Asia. That was only the beginning. One by one, youthful backpackers, European diplomats and rugged mountain climbers started turning up at his shop like disciples, guided by the address on a plastic bag.
None had any interest in cat litter, poodles or aquariums. They had come to Glasgow in search of an answer to a mystery they had encountered on their travels thousands of miles away: Why, from the blue-tiled mosques of Uzbekistan to the hairpin turns of the mountainous Karakoram Highway, were so many people carrying bags adorned with Mr. Thomson's red parrot?
Border guards in Pakistan use them to hold their lunch. Kyrgyz shoppers stuff them with pickled fish, speckled rice and malodorous meat. Camels once traversed the sandy paths of Central Asia's legendary trade route, the Silk Road. But today's traders think nothing of carrying their wares in a Scottish parrot sack.
Without knowing it, Mr. Thomson had turned his cramped pet shop into one of the best-known brand names in Central Asia. In this age of global capitalism, the parrot sack is a bizarre mutation, a peculiar byproduct of the big bang that has led the planet's most diverse peoples and cultures to be united by nothing more substantial than the Nike swoosh, the Golden Arches or Mr. Thomson's red bird.
"I was really flummoxed at the beginning," the pet salesman says, adjusting his spectacles as an employee vacuums birdseed from the rug. Soon after the German wrote, a group of merry Scots having a dinner party in western China rang up. "We'd be happy if you'd settle an argument," they giggled into the phone. "How did these bags come to be here?"
Good question. A reconnaissance mission to the tiny, mountainous republic of Kyrgyzstan suggests western China itself is the source of all that is plastic and parrot-festooned. The traders bringing the bags here are Uighurs, the Muslim minority group from China's restive desert region of Xinjiang. They sell their wares at a giant, muddy market in the Kyrgyz capital of Bishkek, lunching on dumplings and noodles as shoppers paw through brightly colored fabrics, stacks of buckets and rows and rows of parrot bags.
"We don't talk to journalists," one mutters in broken Russian when asked about the bags, disappearing into a metal hut before his picture can be snapped.
These secretive agents, Mr. Thomson believes, buy the bags from a giant plastics factory in Urumqi, the capital of Xinjiang. The plant prints about 150,000 bags for the pet shop a year and churns out millions of variations on the side for extra profit, he says, adding that some of his business associates suggested to him that the sacks may be part of an elaborate scheme to milk subsidies from the Chinese government. "The machines are going 24 hours a day, I'm told," he says.
Mr. Thomson's sacks carry the classic design -- a red parrot on a white bag with the address 992 Pollokshaws Road, Glasgow. Most of the bags in Central Asia once copied the same motif, only on a yellow sack. But a stroll through the Alamadeen food market in Bishkek shows the parrot has begun to mutate wildly. One knockoff boasts two red parrots, the wrong address on Pollokshaws Road and, oddly, the words "More, More, More!" Another shows two red robins clearly inspired by the parrot and the message "The Plastic Bag Shop. Welcome Patronage."
Mr. Thomson can't fathom why his parrot became the subject of such admiration. He's too busy with squawking birds and barking dogs to get to
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
Which sounds pretty sensible to me. If these bags had even a tiny monetary value, they'd soon be scavanged up by SA's huge impoverished underclass. By forcing merchants to use recyclable bags, the solve an ecological problem and inject a little money into the lower economy too.
"Outside the Western Alaska village of Emmonak, white plastic shopping bags used to start appearing 15 miles from town. They blew out of the dump and rolled across the tundra like tumbleweeds. In Galena, they snagged in the trees and drifted into the Yukon River. Outside Kotlik, on the Yukon Delta, bags were found tangled around salmon and seals. No more. All three villages banned the bags."
Typing monkeys produce 5 pages of gibberish
Sorry guy, S&M is still recreation, not employment!
"Paper or plastic" is a false dichotomy. The best shopping bags are made of cloth. Natural fiber cloth bags can last a very long time-- obviating the need for single or limited use bags. And waste reduction (through reuse) is far more important than any level of recyclability. Natural fiber cloth bags can also theoretically be recycled into paper.
I do not have a signature
Between the thinness of the bags and the ink used on the plastic bags by the shops and supermarkets, attempts of recycling the bags just caused the plastic to be contaminated beyond use.
Additionally the 30micron bags, beyond merely being easier to recycle, will also encourage reuse, since the amounts paid by the consumers out of their own pockets, while certainly not excessive, are quite noticible to the majority of South Africans.
It had been observed that people tend to value what they pay for somewhat more than that which they receive for free...
Part Time Philosopher, Oft Times Romantic, Full Time Unix Geek