Canada bans plastic bags.

:) good news...THANK YOU!

well in new jersey a lot of stores don't even have plastic bags plus you get a 5 cent rebate on your items for using reusable bags. i no its only 5 cents but its a start. they're available for about a dollar a bag but stop&shop has recently upped the price to 1.99 witch i think is completely stupid but most places its available for a dollar so every one should get in on it. and even if you don't use these reusable one just use paper its just as environmentally friendly

The stores will need bag inspectors to stop shop lifting.

This will bring up Constitutional problems, because the bags will be the personnal property of the customers.

How will the store inspect the bags without probably cause?

The store can inspect plastic bags because the store owns the bags.

I wish you green idiots would think things out. This is another green boondoggle like biofuel. Biofuel is causing starvation in poor countries because the price of fuel is going up.

Now with the limination of store bags, honest citizens will be subject to unreasonable search.

Green activist are acting as a shill for retailers to save money on the price of a bag. The same way as Green activist acted as a shill for agribusiness to raise the price of food in order to fuel SUV's.

After creating starvation by raising the price of grain in third world countries. Now Green Nazies want to start unreasonable search at the grocery store.

Thanks for nothing You Green Nazies of Retail Stories.
Jim Mooney

a great effort but impossible and will spawn a whole new breed of bissness for opurtunist who will start makeing plastic bags that look old importing from china or wherever lol

and its too late in the day cars need to go hybrid mandatory nothing else will work

Call your legislators and tell them to introduce similar legislation here in the states!

So, what will we use as garbage bags then? Are we going to buy tote bags AND garbage bags instead of reusing the plastic bags from the grocers?

All of their bizarre foods like ketchup potatoes chips and poutine deserve higher quality carrying apparatuses anyway.

Much love Canada! Way to step it up!

Now we need to work on ridding ourselves of polystyrene products.

im sure there will be alot more thefts in the us... but im for it!

Any little step to help the world is the steps we should be taking already.why its taken so long to realize simple steps like the elimination of plastic bags...i hope people make the switch every little bit helps!

This is great!
Sadly this is another reason why Canada is better than America.

today I've been reminded of how much i love my country! Trash to energy conversion, banning plastic bags, decentralized solar technology ... Canada is certainly leading the charge in support of sustainable living and environmental awareness in North America. This is all a result of public outcry for change! Americans have the same power to speak up ... write your political officials ... demand change.

Finally, A good idea from China. I knew it had to happen sooner or later, and it worked. Now Canada has adopted the idea. Let's be next USA!!

Canada can be really awesome sometimes. I wish the US could consider putting some sort of enforcement on that. After all, taking 2 cents off of an order for using reusable ones does not convince many customers to stop using plastic.

thats pretty cool small steps working towards saving our environment

Amazing news. If only all of the US would follow our northern neighbors lead.

Portland and a few other cities have..

i live in Canada. There is no official plan to ban plastic bags, but there should be.

This article shows how 2 small towns in Manitoba, Canada have decided to ban them municipally.

Kudos to the fine folks of Leaf Rapids, Manitoba, but please note that the other 99.9999% of Canada still has plastic bags.

onechance,

I'm not saying that totes aren't a bad idea. It's just that people were focusing on plastics like it was all people used.

I personally use my brown bags or plastic bags as garbage bags. I don't just throw them away afterwards. If I get totes, I'll still have to stuff my garbage somewhere.

And as far as the 50 thing goes, I don't use 50 bags when I'm alone at school, but when the whole family is together over the summer, I think we have an average of 35 bags easy. A few times we have hit 50.

Brown bags are still made out of TREES reaisan...

It's the waste and cutting down of trees that are main factors in environmental damage.

Please, spend a couple bucks and get some cloth bags. I HIGHLY doubt that you really use FIFTY bags... Are you feeding an army?

Don't you all use brown-paper bags?

I'd have to buy 50 totes to carry my weekly groceries. I'm fine with using bio-degradable paper bags.

GREAT NEWS.

Oh and "patrioticastornaut" we're dealing with large corporations (plastic producers) who will choose profit over the environment EVERY TIME. It takes an extreme measure to stop this madness...

im glad places are doing this, i wish that places n my town stoped offering plastic, and it kills me to pick paper aswell. if they stoped offering plastic or paper people would have to bring in there own bags, because it would suck to be walking to your car with nothin to hold it in.

One thing that i'm finding works really well is bringing a few backpacks! super easy to carry and you can fill them to the top to make it a full load...you don't need to worry about the handles falling off because your bag is too heavy :)

Anything we can do to stop adding to the Great Pacific Garbage Patch!

That thing is twice the size of Texas!

GOOD...we need to do that here

I have already begun using reusable bags, I just wish everyone else would as well. This is a great step Canada! Just one more reason to move up north!

Yessssss!

when my family takes the plastic bags from grocery stores we reuse them for the household trash. so now when we can`t even get plastic bags at stores we will have to buy glad bags...that doesn`t sound right

That's great. It drives me absolutely nuts when I see how many bags they use to bag my groceries. And when I ask for paper, they look at me I think I'm too good for plastic or something. Why are there still plastic bags!!!

stephethomson,

Do much grocery shopping lately?:)

Sorry, but I don't think so.

Paper bags have been around for more than 50 years and they are bio degradable.

These thin plastic bags are just a nuisance espeically when no one, except for your grocery store, recycles them.

Another reason to love Canada!

Everybody - SING IT! Take your canvas bag to the supermarket!

http://youtube.com/watch?v=EVh15aUt8-c

Love it !!
Been making the switch for the last few months. Sometimes forgetting the non disposable bags at the front door , or in the closet. They can be bought for one doller where I shop, they really want people to take it seriously. Some stores in AUstin have already banned plastic. A person has to have their own bags. I'm working on something with the school board right now . Did you know that everything is recyclable and the only thing that is garbage is stuff that can break down and decompose?? My trash has gone down to three little bags instead of two or three tall extra large kitchen bags. Once you get it in your head. THere is no way but out of the muck.
peace

I second that one, GO CANADA!

Ok but now what do we use for garbage bags? The plastic lobby CLAIMS plastic use goes up after these bans cause people start using heavy duty bags for garbage.

Canada's all "We're not going to use polluting plastic bags!"; the European Union: "We're going to cut down on carbon emissions by not using traditional light bulbs!"; and Amerca: "Well...sometimes people buy hybrid cars..."

Paper bags aren't much better. You have to cut down a lot of trees to make paper bags.

My food coop in Brooklyn has niether Plastic Bags of plastic water bottles..

http://foodcoop.com/?page=contact

This is great news! Hopefully, everyone will remember to have their reusable bags on them to avoid buying a brand new bag every time they go shopping.

Go Canada!

yeah we must change on ourselves. luckyily the u.s.a wil never make a law forcing us to bring our own bags. but we should use our commonsense to do so

Awesome. Next step, plastic water bottles.

I've been using cloth bags for years - they are so much easier to carry and never break! Score one for Canada!

Our local WalMart only offers plastic! Booo.

The only way to make people change in this country is to hit them in the wallet.

Sweet! I get 3 cents off whenever I bring my own bag to Thrifty's, but I still forget now and then and get plastic to supplement.

Hooray Canada. This is remarkable but would it make a difference. I'm a man of results!

So did China, I think(banning plastic)

This is a good way to end over consumption. If the US got hip to this we could really make a big impact.

--Jade

I think they should all be more proactive, and stop distributing bags, paper or plastic, all together. And it should be the supermarkets themselves who establish that policy. After all, they are establishments pursued for their convenience of proximity, and their product is a vital one - food. So it's not like they'd be risking the loss of patronage.

People will accept it and get used to it so fast it will be like getting a haircut. They'll wonder why they didnt reuse canvas bags all along, and if they have any decency they'll blush.

I can see it all now: the billboard in anticipation of the new ban that reads, "Going to the grocery store? Dont forget your bags." Someone will snap a picture of this billboard because it will have been a message of fleeting relevance, artifact of the postmodern almost overnight.

We had better get on board before this train leaves the station. It does't seem as if our government entities are going to do anything. We certainly don't want to miff the plastic (petroleum) industry. I have no problem buying cotton bags from my stores. It would be even better if the sacks had a big sign on the side, MADE IN THE U.S.A. BY HAND.

i completely agree with judahevan, taxing them would be a better idea..in Ireland i think its about 33 cents or something like that(plastic bags), and now nobody uses them anymore...but this was in 2004, and the next 2 times i brought my own bag. Now here, theyre 99 cents at the store i go to(the reusable bags) and they hold more stuff in them. My friends think im insane, but i use them all the time and I would love for the US to take that kind of a stand.

nice one canada!

GO CANADA!!....
a maple leaf forever...

its not fascist and even if it was who cares.. the envirornment is getting slightly nothin major but slightly better... and if you check your history books fascism and dictator ship made two very powerful countries from basically scrap metal: Germany and Italy in WW2 (and one for that matter).... true both Mussolini and Hitler weere A-holes but as far as philantrophy and leadership goes, they were succesful

awsome!!!!!!!!

This is a little fascist and what all of these people shouting about how great this is have not considered is how those little reusable bags really do not benefit people who go to the store and purchase vast amounts of groceries at one time, i.e. to feed a family of four. Do you know how many of those reusable bags someone would have to own to fit $300.00 worth of groceries in.

Well, I guess it will not matter as long as grocery stores continue to produce paper bags, but I am not sure when the last time I saw a paper bag here in Australia.

I love my reuseables. They fold up with a snap and hold more items than a plastic. I really like knowing my wine is safe and not going to crash out in the parking lot, like with the flimsy plastic bags. Has anyone seen the 2x Texas size plastic island in the pacific. I hear that plastic sand floats up to Oahu once a year. Gross, I just need to find dishsoap in a glass bottle and I'll be set!

It is great to see a nation taking responsibility for it's greater role on the planet!

This is a little fascist, but ok.

i usually opt for my backpack for groceries, but i wrap cold/wet things up in plastic bags. I use them to clean up messes and have a trash bag all in one, especially animal messes. I think it is great that an entire country can ban something harmful to the environment, but there are practicalities for plastic bags & as long as they are disposed of properly or recycled back at the supermarket there shouldn't be a problem... and yet, it exists.

overall: A wonderful step in the right direction.

An alternative is always the bio-degradable grown plastic which keeps the sanitary effect provided by plastics for some time, but allows them to bio-degrade without harmful remainders which might run-off in only a few monthes, if composted.

its things like this that will really turn around where we're headed evironmentally and polution-wise. and if jobs are lost then the country can create jobs involving wind, solar energy etc. or if they really miss their bags why don't they just get a job making non-plastic bags?

I try to be environmentally friendly, but i can't see reusable bags as useful...

At all the stores I go to, they're like $20, and very weak. So I can't afford enough of them to get all that I need home. I can't return to the store, because gas is WAY too expensive for that... so i'm pretty dependant on plastic bags.

I feel bad about it.. but there's not much that i can really do. I can't go spend 2-3 hundred on bags. You can see my dilemma.

Whoopee.... now all they need to do is ban tar sand excavation that more than makes up for announcing this. Their government is not even considering a carbon tax so the CO2 will continue to roll in Canada regardless.

Great stuff - pity everything that goes into the new reusable bag is packaged in plastic.

North America is sadly well behind europe where plastic bags have been replaced for years.
I believe bag boys are to blame for america's slowness to act on this issue.

There are similar stores in the u.s., ipodrulz... one here is named Save-A-Lot, another Aldi's.

Just in the last year I've seen the reusable bags go from being offered in one store here in my town to being offered in almost all of them. Prices range from 1-3 dollars per bag. I probably have a dozen of them now! I forget once in a while, but it's becoming a habit to bring them.

The reusable canvas bags are *nice* when they're used over in the states but they really don't help matters when one considers the shear amount of plastic bags produced nonetheless. It'd be nice to see the US shift to 100% reusable bags but we'd also be the first to shout bloody murder when "jobs are lost" due to the closing of bag factories and what not.

I'v noticed a lot of stores are starting to sell these reusable bags. Including Home Depot - my family actually got one for our grocery shopping. Here there has always been a chain of supermarkets called No-Frills (don't know if it's Canada only) that has never offered plastic bags. Instead they give you the cardboard boxes that all their products are shipped in.