The Ministry of Environment has selected October 15 to celebrate the Day without Plastic Bags. The members of Rede Ecoblogs—of which I’m a proud participant—have prepared this beautiful e-card (above) to make people aware of the number of plastic bags consumed in Brazil and stimulate them to go an entire week without using them.
And I will go even further: I’m working to eliminate them for good. With patience and determination, we can replace the infamous plastic bags with alternative bags.
I’ve written several posts about it:
Ladybug Lu Freitas has precious tips on how to get rid of plastic bags. Take a look and do your part too: help to spread this campaign! You can e-mail this e-card to your friends; or tell in your blog what you are doing to replace the plastic bag, with a link to Rede Ecoblogs: http://www.ecoblogs.com.br/, all right? I’m counting on your contribution!
To paraphrase our dear Cintia Costa: “kisses (one from me and another one from the planet)!”
“Bags are a drag. For us, for the city, for the planet and for the future.” This is the slogan for the national campaign launched in Sao Paulo by Carlos Minc, Minister of Environment, on Tuesday (June 23), with the support of Wal-Mart, a supermarket chain. This initiative seeks to raise people’s awareness to say no to plastic bags, whenever possible, and to adopt alternative ways of transporting their groceries and packing their waste.
“Today is a happy day and may everybody follow this good example. Let’s reduce the use of plastic bags, reuse them and say no to them whenever possible so that soon, just as it happened with the aluminum cans, the plastic industry will find itself closing the entire circuit, either by generating energy, another plastic or construction materials,” pointed out Minc, during the launch.
To reach the population, two 30-second videos were produced for the campaign and presented during the launch. One of them shows a relaxed and humorous speech by the campaign spokesperson, Jose Lima, founder of the AfroReggae group, in which he encourages citizens to refuse, reduce and reuse plastic bags. Print materials, such as ads, brochures, posters and stickers where also produced to promote the campaign. In addition, the campaign has a blog that provides information and tips on conscious consumption, as well as on alternative ways to replace plastic bags in our daily activities.
Every year, Brazil consumes 12 billion plastic bags and each Brazilian uses approximately 66 bags per month. The data provided by the Brazilian Association of Supermarkets (Abras) and other data by the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) shows that the negative effects of these “harmless” plastic bags are already reaching distant locations, considered true tourist and ecologic paradises. Also, 500 billion bags are out there, clogging rivers, lakes and sewers, polluting the ocean, killing fish, turtles and other animals.
Crass mistakes? They forgot to post the videos on YouTube and the blog is not working properly. It seems that now we have some heavy-weigh allies in our fight against plastic bags.
Via the Ministry of Environment website; tip by Lu Monte
Photo: Plastic Bags waiting for Recycling, by evelinshere, at Flickr under CC
The Arctic Sunrise ship continues its trip along the Brazilian coast with the Save the Planet expedition. It’s Now or Now for people to learn a little bit about the environmental problems affecting this country and the world. The ship has already been to Manaus, SantarĂ©m, BelĂ©m, Fortaleza and Recife, and is now approaching Abrolhos, in the State of Bahia. After that, it will go to Salvador, Rio de Janeiro and finally to Santos, in the end of March.
The ship’s crew works extremely hard every day from seven in the morning to six in the afternoon to keep everything in order. On board it is worth following your grandma’s advice, remember? If you used it, wash it. It you took it out, then put it back. And so on and so forth. The video below shows a day in the life of the gang on board the Arctic Sunrise:
O Escriba
Blogroll
About the Project | Terms of Use | Privacy Policy
