Say No to plastic.

The move away from plastic bags is gathering some steam!

Climate change news and advocacy groups are leading the charge to encourage companies to find ways to move away from single use containers that ultimately end up in landfills.

Whole Foods is the most recent high profile retailer to phase out plastic bags :

The Austin-based natural and organic grocer announced Tuesday that it will stop using disposable plastic bags at checkouts and encourage reusable bags instead.

The decision affects all of the company’s 270 stores in the U.S., Canada and the United Kingdom. Whole Foods said it plans to stop using plastic bags by Earth Day, April 22.

The company will continue to offer recycled paper grocery bags.

It planned to give out more than 50,000 reusable shopping bags to customers at the checkouts Tuesday morning. read the full story.

I was impressed by an Australian website – “we all win when we get rid of plastic bags”. Our family has started to phase out use of plastic bags and the biggest challenge has been remembering to take the bags from the trunk of our car into the grocery store.

Why not avoid plastic bags completely at the checkout? We started ordering some of our groceries from an on-line grocer, Small Potatoes Urban Delivery, and your groceries come in a reusable tote, and limited plastic produce bags are used.

……..

UPDATE: The City of Vancouver is looking to get some consensus on a Metro ban on plastic bags. This would certainly be the fastest way to change everyone’s usage habits.

City council agreed Thursday to ask Metro Vancouver to have its waste committee report to the area’s 22 municipalities in 90 days on ways to phase out the use of plastic bags.

Read the full article in the February 1st, 2008 Vancouver Sun.

Share on Facebook