Plastic bags, convenient though they might be, are a blight on the landscape and an environmental hazard. We need to drastically cut our use of them.
Last fall, Victoria city councillors Ben Isitt and Jeremy Loveday proposed drafting a bylaw that would ban retailers from providing single-use plastic bags. A staff recommendation sent to Victoria city council this week would encourage businesses to levy a fee of at least 10 cents on each bag.
That鈥檚 not likely to make much difference, given the voluntary aspect of the proposal, and the fact that it would affect businesses only in the city, putting them at a disadvantage.
Gillian Montgomery of the environmental group Surfrider Foundation, which has been lobbying for an outright ban on single-use plastic bags, was surprised and disappointed at the recommendation.
鈥淎 voluntary 10 cents is very weak,鈥� she said.
On the other hand, it is a step in the right direction, encouraging businesses and people to ponder their use of plastic and the effect it can have on the environment.
While some cities, even countries, have imposed outright bans on the thin plastic bags, that takes away a consumer choice. Sometimes they are the best means for transporting food items susceptible to contamination. To prohibit the bags entirely might increase the risk of spoilage and illness in some situations.
But there are too many plastic bags floating around 鈥� literally. The Vancouver Island chapter of the Surfrider Foundation says that on a single Coastal Cleanup Day in 2012, more than one million plastic bags were picked up around the world, and the bags consistently make the top-10 list of items collected during beach cleanups.
The bags are found not only on beaches. They are ubiquitous. Light and easily blown about by the wind, they become snagged on trees and shrubs, even in remote places. They drift into waterways, where they can clog streams and sicken wildlife. Carried out to sea, bags and other plastic items eventually disintegrate into smaller particles that are harmful to marine organisms along the whole food chain.
According to the European Commission, the stomachs of 94 per cent of all birds in the North Sea area contain plastic.
Los Angeles, San Francisco, Portland and Seattle have had a ban on plastic bags in place for several years. Italy banned the bags in 2011.
In April 2015, the European Parliament passed a law requiring member countries to drastically limit the use of plastic bags, with an initial threshold of 90 bags per person per year by 2019, reducing that use to 40 bags per person by 2025.
sa国际传媒 uses nearly three billion plastic shopping bags each year, about 83 per person.
Outright bans aren鈥檛 the only solution. Denmark brought in a tax on plastic bags in 1993, resulting in a 60 per cent reduction in use. After imposing a levy on plastic bags in 2002, Ireland saw a 90 per cent decrease in the use of the bags within five months.
Curtailing the use of plastic bags is nothing new and radical for the region 鈥� several major stores in the area have either stopped providing single-use bags or charge a fee. People are used to the idea, and reusable shopping bags are widely used.
Victoria could take a step in the right direction with the voluntary approach. Let鈥檚 see how that works before we go for an outright ban.
