Ireland placed a tax on plastic bags five years ago, China and Bangladesh has just banned them.  Now Christchurch council is considering the possiblity of joining in with a ban.

The council are looking into the possible ban of plastic bags including even the re-usable type.  They are launching a scheme next month to encourage shoppers to use eco-friendly, fair-trade cotton bags.  The bags will be on sale from the Regent Centre from February 2nd printed with the logo "Say No to Plastic Bags" and have been sourced from India.

Plastic bags from supermarkets are issued in the billions in the United Kingdom and most are non-recycle and some are bio-degradeable.  These bags litter the countryside, laying on the roadside, hanging in trees and hedgerows and shredded onto barbed wire fences.  Bags are found in great numbers in corners of shopping and housing areas, blown there by the wind and  disposed  by careless or uncaring consumers.  On many beaches you can see bags laying washed up on the tide line and these bags also cause distress or death to wildlife which choke on them. 

These plastic bags are only used on average for 12 minutes but many will take hundreds of years to decompose in landfill sites.  Also in decomposing they will release climate changing methane gas, which is 20 times more damaging than CO2.

Manufacture of plastic bags is usually from oil and it's chemical residue.  Here the energy used and climate changing pollutants generated far outweigh the actual benefits of using plastic shopping bags to carry goods home.  If we consider then the cost of transport and warehousing of these bags before their final use is it really warranted to continue to use these bags.

So with this in mind Colin Dewsnap, former chief executive on the council and presently chairman of the environment action group within the Christchurch Community Partnership is masterminding the crusade.

Cllr. Mrs.Spencer, mayor of Christchurch will open the start of the campaign at noon on the February 2nd at the Regent Centre where prior to the launch all are welcomed to view a documentary by the BBC on the distress of marine wildlife caused by debris.