Mahi

Plastic bags are everywhere and Everyday, we are handed countless plastic bags.Yes, sometimes, plastic bags are convenient, as they are water resistant and light and inexpensive compared to paper bags.

But Here are some questions we should ask ourselves whenever we are handed a plastic bag: -

• Do I need to take as many plastic bags in supermarkets?
  
• Do I need a plastic bag for an item purchased that is already well packaged by the manufacturer?
  
• Could I bring my own shopping bag when making purchases?
  

  

Plastic bags are the cause of major environmental concerns. Most of them go straight to our landfill and

a very small percentage of plastic bags are actually recycled.

Here are the reasons why you should limit your consumption of plastic bags:-

Because of their light weight, plastic bags fly easily in wind, float along readily in the currents of rivers and oceans, get tangled up in trees, fences, poles, and so forth, and block the drainage.

Plastic bags are made from a non-renewable natural resource-petroleum. The manufacturing of plastic bags contributes to the diminishing availability of our natural resources and the damage to the environment from the extraction of petroleum.Most plastic bags are made of polyethylene – more commonly known as polythene – they are hazardous to manufacture and are said to take up to 1,000 years to decompose on land and 450 years in water.

Countless plastic bags end up in our ocean and cause harm to our marine wildlife,who mistakenly ingest plastic and choke in plastic bags that is floating around. It is estimated 100,000 marine mammals die each year because of plastic litter in our ocean in the North Pacific. Land animals also to be victims as well. In countries such as India , cows mistakenly ingesting plastic bags on the streets as they are scavenging for food and end up choking or starving to death, as plastic cannot be digested. There is virtually no market for recycling plastic bags.your local supermarkets collect used plastic bags for recycle, very few are actually recycled.Whereas,most paper bags are made from recycled paper

During the last few years, status of environment instead of improving has gone from bad to worse. Without elaborating upon what went wrong? How and Why” I would like to invite the attention of the common public to pollution in River Tawi. Jammu city may be the only city in the whole of India which is associated with the name of river Tawi. Raja Jumbo-lochan laid the foundation of this city after having witnessed drinking of water by a Panther and a goat from the same Tawi River. Thus people of Jammu have got cultural, religions and social connections, attachment with this river, but their indifferent insensitive behaviour and life style has resulted in severe pollution and even survival of this river is in great jeopardy.

The river is being polluted by throwing of garbage, discharge of sewage, chemical effluents, open defication, silt from degraded catchment, washing of vehicles etc. It has an adverse effect on fish, animals and wild animals and habitations using this water for drinking, agricultural or any other use.

The hard facts like population explosion, mismanagement in the disposal of sewerage water of the old city and lack of awareness among the people have contributed a lot for spoiling clean and fresh Tawi water. The ‘deliberate ignorance’ on part of certain agencies and the attitude of escapism has further aggravated the problem.

It is unfortunate that despite J&K High Court directions and several notices by the State Pollution Control Board, Jammu Municipal authorities and the UEED have failed to take necessary measures and stop direct flowing of old city drain waters and garbage to river Tawi. A little effort by the Municipal authorities two years back, by launching a micro ‘ Clean Tawi project’ could not yield any fruitful results. The PCB authorities had reportedly served atleast 3-4 notices to these two main civic agencies regarding proper management of sewerage water which is highly polluting the Tawi river water, serving as the lifeline for the people here.

In Bangladesh , plastic bags have been banned completely since early 2002 as they were found to have been the main cause of floods during the 1988 and 1998 that submerged two-thirds of the country. In 2001, Mumbai council also eliminated the use of plastic bags to prevent them from littering the streets and clogging up the city’s sewerage system. As a result, merchants have switched to recycled paper bags and litter in the city has been reduced considerably. As consumers, we should not wait for our governments to tackle the problem of plastic bags. Change ultimately comes from everyone WAKE UP ! THERE MAY STILL BE TIME

If every human alive today consumed natural resources and emitted carbon dioxide at the same rate as the average person in the developed world, then we would need at least another two Planet Earths, if not three – WWF

• Do u Care For Your Earth?
• Do You Actually Wanna Be a Reasn To Save It?

Please Take A Pledge & Save Our Precious World,Make It Beautiful to Live In…

Be the change you wish to See in others.So First You on your own, Stop using plastic bags and then suggest others because Good work starts from your own home.