We want to go green!! at least a bit?
| Posted in Hyderabad, India, Thoughts | Posted on 29-12-2008
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Me and my wife have the same kind of mindset (lucky for me) and have been thinking we should do something to contribute for a greener tomorrow. But how? Where do we start? Our first thought was avoiding the use of plastic bags completely. Plastic bags have become a way of life here in Hyderabad and of course all over India. You only use plastic bags even though you have a choice. You use plastic bags because they come for free with shopping and you don’t have to carry anything while going to shopping. Well its easy that way right? But lately, we should learn that each family can use a significant number of plastic bags every year (about 200-500). Yes that’s a very little number of bags in an estimated 5 Billion used worldwide every year. That’s 500,000,000,000 ? That’s 1 million bags every minute? Lets not think at a level of filling the underground drainage with plastic bags and overflowing drains. Talk about destroying the planet with plastic, trash and pollution. Like the movie Wall-E?
Avoiding plastics may be a very small thing. But I guess its a good start for a better tomorrow.
Like Al Gore says in his presentations,
Our children might think..
“What were our parents thinking?”
We have to hear that question. Now!
Ya we heard that! Did you?
We want to spread the word as we follow it. But no resources are available. I mean a jute bag or a cloth bag with a message on it about avoiding plastics. Where do we get something like that? And how do we let others also use those bags with a message? How can we make our thought bigger? Much Bigger? How?
Share your thoughts and let us know your suggestions. And in the first place let us know if you are with us in this?
With you on this one, mate. But the problem, like you said is about the reach. While it might look daunting, it needs to be started. The Chinese have a saying – “A million mile journey begins with one step”. Very apt. We should, for starters take our own bags to shops. We can probably think of contributing some cloth bags to a supermarket like Foodworld, which we will place near the billing counter, and ask patrons to use them. Feasibility of such an idea? Your guess is as good as mine. But worth a try, and this is a good direction.
-Ram.
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Looking at the plastic bags all over the city, I could see switching to reusable shopping bags is the best possible way. We may think of the burden to carry a reusable plastic bag while shopping, but when not in use some reusable bags can be rolled or folded small enough to fit easily into a pocket. Where there’s a will there’s a way!
You can find a good selection of high-quality reusable bags online at reusablebags.com
And talking about Going Green, planting a Tree is the only possible way to switch to a greener Earth.
If you have the means to plant a tree, start digging. Trees are an integral part of the natural atmospheric exchange cycle, but there are too few of them to fully counter the increases in carbon dioxide caused by automobile traffic, manufacturing and other human activities. A single tree will absorb approximately one ton of carbon dioxide during its lifetime. So, start thinking of planting a tree near ur house, in ur colony, near ur working area, etc.. and also encourage ur frnds / neighbors to do so.
Please share ur thoughts…
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This might be interesting for you. I met this guy (Sailesh Rao) when he visited our office. A Stanford graduate inspired by Algore, quit his company and founded Climatehealers.
Interestingly, he is using the technology to save the world from the effects of the same technology developments.
Here is the website that contains more information about his work
http://www.climatehealers.org/home.html
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Good start.. A more practical solution to this problem is recycling plastic bags. We can raise awareness among our fellow citizens abt the advantage and need to recycle these bags. Then setup collection points where people can drop off used plastic bags, which can eventually be dropped off at recycle companies. This can be started in our own apartment or colony. Eventually with everyone else getting involved, it can be spread to the whole city and so on….
Its not equivalent to not using plastic bags at all. But at least, we can get them off of landfills. And also recuperate some of the material cost.
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I think grocery stores should be the first one to take an initiative in this regard. They should come up with some innovative ideas in order to encourage people to use environment friendly bags.
In any grocery store in Bahrain, customers need to insert 100 fils coin to get a trolley and they can get back their coin if they place the trolley at any of its pick up points after using it. So, this gimmick prevents the trolleys to be placed here and there in a haphazard manner and people become more organized only to save their 100 fils.
Therefore, supermarkets can offer reward points for the people who continuously use reusable bags.
People/public will never change until and unless they are forced with some gimmick.
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With you on this one Vamsi. Personally, I find paper bags easier to handle. My two cents: Buy a set of paper bags, and use them for all your shopping needs.
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Agreed….!! And i see this has already been started in few places of Hyderabad also for the good sake. The only feeling which we were having is it is light weighted and easy to carry & we can re-use them as trash bags but we never think of the environmental impacts. Anyways all for our good sake..lets start here and slowly we try avoiding the usage of these bags.
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Wish you Happy and prosperous New Year 2009..
http://www.hyderabadghar.com
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With you Vamsi..
There is a need for this. Probably more easier way to implement is to stop at the source than to try and change every individual’s behavior pattern. If we are successful in pursuing shopping malls to switch to eco friendly bags from plastic bags, it would take care of most of the problem. As Vamsi rightly pointed out that the plastic bags are reused as trash bags, its a bigger problem… the organic waste gets trapped in these plastic bags and do not decompose. Inturn this garbage rots and releases methane gas which is much faster at depleting ozone layer.
We can direct the shopping malls to NGOs who make eco friendly bags (paper, jute or cloth) so that is easier to pursue them in the name of CSR. The malls can charge the customers for the bags if they are concerned about the cost which could be around 2/- per bag which am sure would not matter to the customer. This is similar to the plastics covers that are sold at 1/- per cover at Rytu bazar for the people who do not carry a bag for shopping.
I might sound impractical … but its possible as many shops have already resorted to paper bags.
Great initiative Vamsi. I hope we make a difference.
Meena S
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Very interesting ideas. It has got me thinking. I will sure try handing out cloth bags to people by standing outside a super market. I will invest my pocket money, if needed. You know why I am worried? It is OK if people realize my efforts and bring their bags next time. If not, well…there is a limit to my pocket money!
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I think they best way to avoid plastic bags is that every shopping corner should display boards asking its customers to bring their own bags but not of plastic. These was into existence in olden days in some rural areas. The same should be implemented again
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Hi!….
I was searching on internet and I found your post…..it is really interesting…keep it up….look
forward to read more from you…
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