Oh, those shopping bags

Nothing annoys Mountain Equipment Co-op's national sustainability manager more than watching a customer buy a backpack, then ask for a plastic bag to put it in. "You just bought a bag!" said Denise Taschereau, who helped spearhead MEC's switch from plastic to organic corn-based, compostable shopping bags on November 2. "Why do you need another one?"

The best bag is no bag, Taschereau told the Straight. (Still, the national retailer normally distributes about 510,000 plastic bags each year-a fraction of the approximately 10 billion that Canadians use in total.) MEC stands at the Canadian forefront of a brewing global consciousness about the environment and plastic bags, which take about 100 years to break down.

With the frenzied Christmas shopping season about to seize Vancouver, though, the malls are awash with festive polyethylene, no matter how environmentally conscious we all are.

Shoppers, start your brains. You've got multiple choices: a) Accept a disposable bag and recycle it; b) Bring your own bag; c) Only shop at stores with good bag practices; d) Do like most of us do-accept a bag, use it once or even twice, throw it in the Dumpster, then feel guilty.

We're not alone in seeking a better way. Vancouver's plastic-bag behaviour is both far behind and far ahead of the rest of the world. To start with a pat on the back, many local retailers accept bags for recycling. Among them: London Drugs, Overwaitea Food Group, and Safeway. MEC and the Hemp Store have switched to compostable bags; Plum Clothing Co. is distributing a funky reusable "lunch" bag instead of a plain plastic one; for years, the Real Canadian Superstore has forced customers to pay a four-cent disincentive when requesting a bag; and Capers Community Markets, which uses recycled plastic bags, offers a five-cent discount if you bring your own bag.

Now for the many kicks in the pants. The first one is from Canadian BioBag franchise owner Greg Beresford, who sells MEC its environmentally friendly bags. "Vancouver is not the greenest city in Canada; most of my business is back East," he told the Straight.

Second, Canada lags behind many other countries in bag-breaking legislation. In 2002, Ireland, slapped a 25-cent "PlasTax" on all plastic shopping bags; within six months, their use dropped by 90 percent. Scotland and South Africa are looking at implementing similar legislation. Australia just tabled a major report on plastic bags, the first step in developing legislation. India, Bangladesh, and Taiwan are months away from banning the manufacture of plastic bags within their borders, following in the footsteps of Papua New Guinea, which banned the use of plastic shopping bags. In Canada? Individual consumer choice still rules.

Third, even though recycling is available to Vancouverites, the vast majority of bags end up in the landfill. "We need to raise the consciousness in B.C.," said Craig Foster, a consultant to the Canadian Plastics Industry Association.

From a retail point of view, the right decision is less clear. As Alan Wilson, owner of local furniture-and-accessories shop Industrial Revolution, told the Straight, a shopping bag serves multiple purposes. It protects purchases from the rain, establishes a store's identity and brand, and acts as a calling card through the phone number and Web address printed on it. Industrial Revolution bags are, of course, recyclable.

• Canadians use 55 million new plastic bags a week. That's about two per person.
• Worldwide, about one trillion plastic bags are consumed each year.
• Plastic bags wash up on the shores of the Falkland Islands, endangering the marine animals that eat them.
• Taiwan is one of the world's largest consumers of plastic bags-about 900 per person per year.
• Plastic bags are a Canadian growth industry. Ten years ago, the industry employed 6,320 people and was worth $214 million in exports. In 2004, it employed 8,310 people and had exports of $498 million, according to Industry Canada.
• The City of Vancouver does not offer a plastic-bag-recycling program. Maple Ridge, Delta, Coquitlam, Nanaimo, and Port Moody are among the B.C. municipalities that do.
• Plastic film-including shopping bags, garbage bags, cling film, and tarps-makes up about five percent of the Greater Vancouver Regional District's landfill.
• Between 0.1 and three percent of plastic bags get recycled (according to widely varying statistics). Almost half get reused, and the rest go straight to the landfill.