A PBF U.K. Mission Statement

Dear All

Your Oban Plastic Bag Free! blogger takes pleasure in posting here the contents of a PBF U.K. Mission Statement. It is a great idea for forming a Plastic Bag Free Forum to target the U.K. Government.

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No, not a dream but reality within 2 years:
The reason for the Forum is that it will have a direct involvement with the government's Environment Committee, chaired by Hilary Benn and it will serve as the ‘eyes and ears’ of the PBF world in the UK.

Action not words.
Rebecca Hosking from Modbury and Sue Kinsey at MCS agree with me that this is the next, obvious step to take. The PBF U.K Forum will comprise of representatives from every area aiming to go plastic bag free or a representative for a group of communities. Elected by the groups doing the actual work in their locality, the
representatives will have the knowledge and support of their local community.
The Forum aims to build on, and work in conjunction with, the excellent work being done by other groups such as the Google plastic bag free forum.
The Forum will know, from its members, the situation in each area and be able to produce facts and figures for the government’s Environment Committee. I’ve been assured that this group will be listened to from contacts in London and by a direct exchange from those working with [the] Environment Committee.

One voice:
There are various plastic bag free sites such as ‘Abolish Plastic Bags’ and the Google forum site and I want to bring all these groups together. I am contacting all those people responsible for these kinds of websites across the UK as it is better to have a strong, coherent and factual voice, all under one umbrella that will be accepted as an authority on PBF for the UK.

Tony Langham.
01722-328847
grandadforest [AT] btinternet.com
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Please leave a comment on this blog and/or enter Tony's e-mail address manually if you wish to contact him to express your support of his idea.

Reducing plastic bags: new figures show efforts by retailers and consumers deliver results

Hello All

I'm very pleased to focus on a bit of fairly good news today, which is that our efforts to curb the use of plastic bags is having an effect. WRAP (www.wrap.org.uk) published this announcement in February 2009:

Retailers exceed carrier bag reduction target

26 February 2009

New figures show efforts by retailers and consumers delivering results

New figures released today by WRAP (Waste & Resources Action Programme) [1] show the UK’s leading high street and grocery retailers have exceeded a voluntary target to reduce the environmental impact of carrier bags by 25% by the end of 2008.

Since 2006, retailers have delivered a 40% reduction in the environmental impact of carrier bags, as measured by the reduction in the amount of virgin plastic used. [2] Retailers have achieved this by reducing the number of carrier bags issued by 26%, increasing recycled content used and reducing carrier bag weight. [3]

The target to reduce the environmental impact of carrier bags was part of an agreement with UK Governments and industry in February 2007 which has been met in full by a reduction in bag numbers alone.

This achievement also reflects the active engagement of consumers, who have helped to make it happen.

Dr Liz Goodwin, WRAP CEO said:

“Consumers deserve congratulations for these results as they clearly show we are moving away from using bags once to re-using bags often. They are also a credit to retailers who have worked hard to find innovative ways of helping us re-use our bags.”

Over the past two years, WRAP has been collecting data and monitoring initiatives by retailers that help reduce the environmental impact of carrier bags including encouraging re-use through reward schemes, promoting bags for life and charging for bags.

The data shows that initiatives by retailers [4] to reduce the environmental impact of carrier bags have resulted in a 23,000 tonne reduction in the weight of carrier bags issued. The total number of bags in circulation has reduced from 13.4 billion in 2006 to 9.9 billion in 2008, equivalent to a 26% reduction.

Jane Milne from the BRC [British Retail Consortium, 5] said;

“Congratulations to all our customers and check-out colleagues who have done so much to achieve this result. With this first target met and exceeded we are now working to halve the number of bags taken by May this year. We need every customer to help us by remembering their bags for life on planned shopping trips and, where they do need to take an ordinary carrier bag, re-using it on five or six shopping trips before returning it for recycling. Together we can do it!” [6, 7, 8, 9]

ENDS

Editor's notes:

1. The agreement was between 21 of the leading high street and grocer retailers and Defra, the then Scottish Executive, Welsh Assembly and Northern Ireland Office. The agreement was actively supported by the Packaging and Film Association (PAFA) via the Carrier Bag Consortium.
2. WRAP’s role in the agreement is to monitor the progress of the agreement through data collection and analysis. The members of the agreement issue their respective data to WRAP voluntarily. WRAP’s remit from the signatories is to issue the results for carrier bag reduction targets across the industry as a whole and not to release individual retailer data.
3. The target was a 25% reduction in the environmental impact of carrier bags. This is being measured by looking at a reduction in the number of carrier bags issued and the amount of virgin plastic which provides a simple way to measure environmental impact.
4. Participating retailers are as follows:
   Asda Wal*Mart
   Boots
   Co-operative Group
   Debenhams
   DSG International plc (Currys and PC World)
   E H Booths & Co Ltd
   Home Retail Group (Argos and Homebase)
   John Lewis Partnership (John Lewis and Waitrose)
   Marks & Spencer
   Next Group plc
   Nisa Todays
   Primark Stores Ltd
   Sainsbury's Supermarkets Ltd
   Somerfield Group
   Spar (UK) Ltd
   Tesco
   Travis Perkins (Wickes)
   Wm Morrison Supermarkets plc
5. A further agreement between the Scottish Government and supermarkets has been made. Defra, the Welsh Assembly Government, and the Northern Ireland Department of the Environment have also made an agreement with the British Retail Consortium (BRC) and its supermarket members. Both agreements aim to reduce the number of single use carrier bags issued to consumers by 50% by the end of May 2009. WRAP has agreed to monitor progress against these targets. The participating supermarkets are Asda Wal*Mart, Co-operative Group, Waitrose, Marks & Spencer, Sainsbury's Supermarkets Ltd, Somerfield Group and Tesco.
6. WRAP works in partnership to encourage and enable businesses and consumers to be more efficient in their use of materials and recycle more things more often. This helps to minimise landfill, reduce carbon emissions and improve our environment.
7. Established as an independent company in 2000, WRAP is backed by government funding from England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.
8. Working in seven key areas (Construction, Retail, Manufacturing, Organics, Business Growth, Behavioural Change, and Local Authority Support), WRAP’s work focuses on market development and support to drive forward recycling and materials resource efficiency within these sectors, as well as wider communications and awareness activities including the multi-media national Recycle Now campaign for England.
9. More information on all of WRAP's programmes can be found on www.wrap.org.uk

   Sarah Brown
   WRAP - Head of Press & PR
   Tel: 01295 819618
   sarah.brown@wrap.org.uk

OBAN PLASTIC BAG FREE! SUPPORTS SCOTTISH GOVERNMENT INITIATIVE

Dear friends

We feel encouraged by a message just in from the SELKIRK PLASTIC BAG FREE campaign, who have decided to publicly SUPPORT THE SCOTTISH GOVERNMENT INITIATIVE.

Here is the wording of their message, which deserves to spread far and wide:

"The Selkirk Plastic Bag Free campaign supports the Scottish Government's initiative to help reduce the use of plastic carrier bags. With Scotland using one billion bags a year and our local authorities spending £385 million a year dealing with waste this new campaign to encourage us all to reduce our carrier bag use by 50% is a welcome step in the right direction.
"Changing habits takes time and it's important to remember that changing our use of plastic carrier bags to reusable bags is an ongoing process, but one that is happening. Change is afoot. The Scottish Government claims that research has shown that 92% of people believe that reusing bags is good for the environment yet 59% still forget to take their own bags with them when shopping. But habits are changing.
"Selkirk is a fine example of this. We know that the town is not yet 100% plastic bag free but our traders and townsfolk are working towards that and change is evident. There has been a significant reduction in the use of plastic carrier bags here and a huge increase in the numbers of those using reusable shopping bags. And our surrounding countryside is cleaner and tidier too.
"It is easy to see how campaigns such as these can drift from people's minds but if we keep up the effort, if we keep talking about it and bringing it back into the public domain then we can surely make more of a difference.
"For all those people out there who are making the effort (and the numbers are substantial) we would say 'Keep up the good work. We are making a difference. Change is happening.'

Jenna Agate
Selkirk Plastic Bag Free"

More volunteers would be welcome!

Hiya all

Since founding member Astrid left for Stirlingshire, the Oban Plastic Bag Free! initiative has lost some of its energy. We could really use one or two more volunteers to help contacting Oban shops and ensure their support of our initiative.

It would be a question of a couple of afternoons in the run-up to Easter.

Would anyone interested kindly contact info @ sustainable-oban.net, please (this is not a hyperlink -- you will need to copy-paste the address by hand to your outgoing e-mail).

We will be delighted to hear from you!

An Oban shop takes an important first step

Hello again

In the run-up to our next public meeting on Friday, January 23, 2009 (Glencruitten Church Hall, Oban, 7 (for 7:15) to approx. 9pm), we would like to highlight an example of an excellent intermediate step taken by one of Oban's prestigious shops:

Ms Ch. Bremner of House and Home was approached with an idea and decided to act on it. This is what she has done: on the counter, her customers can find a donation box and the following notice, reproduced here with Ms Bremner's permission:

Alexander Kilmurray P4,
Eco Committe, Park School
has requested that we should be charging for
Carrier Bags to save Wildlife and the planet.
To comply with this request and encourage the use of
Traditional Shopping Bags and the reuse of Carrier Bags
All Carrier Bags will now incur a charge of 10p each.
All money raised from this will be donated to local charities.
This month's [January 2009] is:
Mary's Meals and Scottish International Relief.
Last month £75.00 was donated to
Oban Christmas Lights Appeal.

Ms Bremner assured your blogger that every month between about £50 and up to £100 have been donated to a local charity.
What a fantastic way of increasing awareness!
Thank you and congratulations, Alexander Kilmurray and Cherren Bremner!

Plasticbag.org.uk - Sustainable Oban Meeting: Jan 23, 2009

Hello again

This is a quick reminder that the
next Sustainable Oban meeting at the Glencruitten Church Hall, Oban

Friday, 23 January, 2009, 7 to approx. 9pm

will include an update on our Initiative to get Oban Plastic Bag Free!

Everyone's most welcome!


Finally, your blogger browsed the web in search of facts on the production of plastic bags.

Plasticbag.org.uk -- "the campaign to reduce the effects of plastic bags on our world" -- is a website that may well be worth your visit.

Cheerioh!

Hello again

Searching for facts and figures on the consumption of energy to produce plastic bags, your blogger has come across a fascinating article by Lucy Siegle in The Observer, Sunday 29 January 2006. Its title is

One family, one month, 50kg of packaging. Why?

Well worth your visit -- simply click on the title to be taken to the full article.

Cheerioh!