GUEST BLOGGER: Rebecca Cutts, Fifty Forward Intern and Rising Senior at Emory University’s Goizueta Business School
“Bring your own____” seems to be an ongoing green trend among Americans today in light of the going green movement. The encouragement to bring your own re-usable bags to grocery stores is now being carried (no pun intended) to other stores, including department, drug, and home improvement stores.
In Seattle, Washington, Mayor Nickels is suggesting a 20-cent green fee on paper and plastic shopping bags in hopes to push the use of reusable bags, which many retail and grocery stores are now selling. Although there are exceptions to the fee, such as dry cleaner bags, and bags for prepared food, some may ask if this is going too far. Mayor Nickels does not think so. Researchers have found “with the bag fee alone, [Seattle] can cut more than 4,000 tons [of greenhouse gas generation] per year…the same as taking 665 cars off the road”
In addition to bringing your own bags, people are finding other new ways to extend the use of re-usables. In the work place, people are bringing in their own coffee mugs as well as silverware, to avoid using the less sustainable Styrofoam cups and plastic silverware.
Even chopsticks have become a common eating utensil when it comes to choosing a sustainable option. I learned how to use chopsticks my freshman year of college to seem more cultured and sophisticated. Who knew I was being environmentally friendly?
Although reducing the use of disposable plastic and paper bags may seem like a small step towards creating a sustainable city, these types of initiatives are what make the green movement, well, move. We all know how much people love change. So without becoming overwhelmed by immediately giving up your car, you may just be asked to try to reduce or to give up your use of plastic and paper bags. Small steps make change possible for bigger steps to be taken.
Small, sustained changes can have huge impacts over the long-term. If a similar bag fee program were instituted in Atlanta, how might Atlanta be different fifty years from now? The bag fee if brought to every city, is an action people could take now to help preserve the future.
Question for thought:
Is it reasonable to ask people to “Bring your own___” or face a standard fee? How would you feel about one day being asked to pay a fee for your to-go boxes or Styrofoam cups? Should this proposal be approved and eventually brought to Atlanta?
June 5, 2008 at 7:43 pm
Of course it’s reasonable! It may seem, to some people, as an outrageous way to get rid of a problem, however, this is not the case; case and point: Ireland.
Ireland instituted a “bag tax” in order to reduce bag consumption, the result? Well, before, 5% percent of all litter in Ireland was due to plastic bags. After the tax was instituted, the drop in plastic bag consumption has reached 90%! And not only that, the revenue generated by the “bag tax” is €10,000,000 annually, which they utilize for other environmentally friendly ventures. Now, the Irish bag tax prevents over 1,000,000,000 bags from being discarded—and all because of a 15¢ tax. Amazing isn’t it?
This is all from a small European country though, if something similar where to be done in a larger scale in the United States, the benefits would be much larger. In the United States, 14 BILLION bags are distributed annually. That is the equivalent of about 12 million barrels of oil, solely for making bags! And sadly, only 1% of those are recycled, the rest take anywhere from 400 to 1,000 years to decay. And even though no tax exists for these bags, the hidden cost to the consumer is 17¢ per bag—originating from the costs to clean up litter, trash, etc . . . all of which are paid through tax payer’s money. Such a revelation should incite people to opt for that 20¢ tax, it might be a little bit more, but it’s money much better well spent (and much more beneficent towards the preservation of our environment)!
As for bringing this “green tax” to Atlanta, it should be done! Starting small is always the key. Promoting the use of canvas bags, for example is one way. Yet, the institution of a similar tax in Atlanta would have huge benefits. Not only will it prevent pollution, it would help reduce the number of bags in the ocean, which has now reached levels of 46,000 bags per square mile—this sadly kills an average of 100,000 marine animals per year. And all because we have decided to spend exorbitant amounts of oil (which is now experiencing rising prices) to produce pollutants that still cost money to the consumer, and take hundreds of years to decay. It should be an obvious choice!
Facts and figures obtained from: http://www.myownbag.com/activism.html
June 6, 2008 at 9:42 pm
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