Plastic Bag Key Points

"Plastics: made to last forever, designed to throw away."
Shift your habits - commit to bringing your own bag
Knowing the impact of plastic pollution on the world, inaction is unacceptable.

http://5gyres.org/what_is_the_issue/the_problem/


New Zealanders go through 1 billion plastic bags each year
"If there weren't any plastic bags available, people would just get into the habit of taking their own bags," says Ms Borrelle. "It's not that big of a shift."

http://www.3news.co.nz/environmentsci/auckland-council-to-rule-on-plastic-bag-ban-bylaw-2014080916#axzz3Xu4epeyk

Despite being a small percentage of the litter, their permanence and prevalence has allowed them to become a type of eyesore that has evolved into an ugly emblem of waste and excess.
Globally, beach clean-ups retrieve close to one and a half million plastic bags a year.
Unlike many other types of plastic, bags can sink, becoming immune to the ultra-violet light that could have eventually broken them down. The extent or impact of plastic bags on the ocean floor is unknown.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10860323

While some kinds of plastic degrade over time, none of it ever completely breaks down. Some of the plastic items in the ocean end up in the bodies of marine wildlife, who mistake them for food. Turtles, for example, occasionally mistake plastic bags for their food staple of jellyfish and suffocate. Dead albatrosses have been found in Hawaii with bellies full of cigarette lighters and bottle caps. Plastic items are considered to cause more marine animals deaths than oil spills, heavy metals, or other toxic materials.
This litter creates a significant hazard for birds, and marine and freshwater fish species and causes direct damage to the environment through leaking toxins as it degrades.

http://www.nzscienceteacher.co.nz/science-education-society/science-education-and-the-environment/our-plastic-oceans/#.VTWpM62eDGc

They are made from oil – each bag uses about the same amount that would drive a car 115 metres – and the average amount of time they are used for their original purpose (carrying something home from the shops) is about 12 minutes.

https://blog.greens.org.nz/2014/05/28/nz-behind-the-times-on-single-use-plastic-bags/


According to government data, New Zealanders use 1.14 billion of petroleum based plastic bags every year, which equates to almost each person using 1 bag a day.

https://www.zerowaste.co.nz/assets/Kiwi_PlasticBag_survey_report_Feb07.pdf


Plastic bags can take hundreds of years to break down in landfills but are generally used for no more than 20 minutes, although most get re-used at home, according to research.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10798151

After an animal is killed by plastic bags its body decomposes and the plastic is released back into the environment where it can kill again.
The 6.9 billion plastic check-out bags we use every year is enough to drive a car 800 million kilometres or nearly 20,000 times around the world.
Not all litter is deliberate. 47% of wind borne litter escaping from landfills is plastic - much of this is plastic bags.
Over 40,000 plastic check-out bags are dumped in landfills every hour in New Zealand.

http://plasticshoppingbagfree.org.nz/facts-and-figures


Avoiding plastic bags is as simple as taking your own bag. Reusable bags, paper bags, biodegradable and compostable plastic bags are readily available as environmentally friendly alternatives to plastic bags."

http://www.wastenet.org.nz/HomeAndGarden/Shopping/PlasticBags.aspx