Comments

The plastic bag thing is rift with issues - there are so many 'altenatives' out there that it is hard to know exactly what the impact might be. It is undoubtedly the case that replacing disposable oil based plastic bags with disposable starch based bags would put pressure on food production. However, there are bags on the market that avoid these issues, for example by utilising non-food quality streams (such as substandard or brownfield corn, or my personal favorite, potato starch from the peel as a waste product from chip and crisp factories). There is a lot of very poor marketing from companies trying to push plastic bags as degradable/biodegradable and these do cause problems, as the guardian article tundraesa quotes points out, but the increasingly widely accepted standard is compostable not biodegradable - to European Standard EN13432 or US Standard ASTM D6400. More to the point, however, is that shops that go 'plastic bag free' (that will usually offer a compostable bag alternatve for a nominal charge) tend to see a drop in usage of between 90 - 95 % (this bears out on my local highstreet which is in the process of going plastic bag free). Reduce, Reuse, Recycle - it is in that order for a reason!