Green Bags
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Green Bags are inexpensive reusable shopping bags common in Australia and also used in some other countries.
Green Bags and similar reusable shopping bags are commonly distributed at the point of sale by supermarkets and other retail outlets. They are intended to be reused repeatedly to replace the use of hundreds of HDPE plastic bags.
This arose from an Australian Federal Government initiative in 2003 – essentially a threat to outlaw plastic bags if retailers did not voluntarily discourage their use.
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[edit] History
[edit] Australia
In 2002 the Australian Federal Government studied the use of throwaway plastic bags and threatened to outlaw them if retailers did not voluntarily discourage their use.
In 2003 the government negotiated with the Australian Retailers Association a voluntary progressive reduction of plastic bag use which led to a number of initiatives, including the widespread distribution and promotion of Green Bags.
[edit] Physical description
[edit] Naming of parts
The standard green bag has two parts: the bag itself, and its base insert.
The bag
Most green bags are made of 100% Non-woven Polypropylene which is recyclable but not biodegradable. Some companies claim to be making NWPP bags from recycled material, however with current manufacturing techniques this is not possible. All NWPP bags are made from virgin material.
Similar bags are made of jute, canvas, calico or hemp but are not discussed here.
Most "green bags" are green; some are blue or red.
The base insert
A typical base insert is 200x300 mm and weighs 30 g.
[edit] Research
Environment Victoria (Australia) has published a study Supermarket bag packing: a comparative time trial which compared the amount of time taken to pack reusable green bags compared with single-use plastic bags. It found great difference between green bags and single-use plastic bags in packing times for small to medium shopping loads (4-16 items); medium-sized loads (32 items) using green bags increased packing time, but by half a minute; larger loads (48 items) increased packing times by almost one minute when using green bags; and the increase in time and staff costs equates to AUD41.6 million annually.
