No More Plastic Bags

"In the end, we will conserve only what we love. We only love what we understand. We only understand what we are taught." -Babia Dioum Senegalese Ecologist

The other day I went shopping and the cashier offered me a cotton bag instead of the previous plastic one. "At last!" I said to myself "Something is changing in the commercial world!".
Looking for information about this idea I've found some campaigns about how to stop using this material in everyday life. There are many countries which have established a date to change this habit. But why?
Only in the UK, people use 10 billion bags a year, of which 200 million end up polluting the environment.
• As well as the energy and emissions they take to make, they take between 450 and 1000 years to decay.
• When they do, even so called ‘degradable’ bags just break down into smaller and smaller particles that pollute land and poison marine life.
• Plastic bags aren’t free - their cost is built into the price of the goods you buy.
• A single cotton carrier can replace 1000 plastic bags over its life - so you can make a huge difference.
• Going shopping with a cotton bag is one of the easiest as well as most effective ways to help the environment.
Want to know more? Enter 'Altered Oceans' page to watch videos and photos or 'Message is in the Waves' from BBC Hawaii.