The recent decision of the City District Government Karachi to ban the use of polythene shopping bags in the city after June 2004 to tackle the ever increasing waste disposal problems is likely to reduce the environmental and financial costs which have increased proportionally because of polythene bags related litter in the city.

The mismanagement in the disposal of the solid wastes, particularly the polythene shopping bags has caused serious threat to the soil, public health, drainage and sewerage system in all of our cities. The drainage system in these cities has collapsed. Although almost all the big cities of the country have also started facing the same problem from polythene bags, the situation in Karachi has gone beyond control.

It was only in the early 80’s when polythene bags came to Pakistan and drove out all other shopping bags from the market on its own merit. Production of polythene bags since then has increased manifold. Polythene shopping bags are used extensively because of their low cost and practical utility. At that time, few paid attention to the fact that this convenience would deal such a severe below to our already fragile urban sewerage system.

According to a cautious estimate a family in Karachi throws five polythene bags every day on an average. It means that about one million polythene bags are thrown daily only in the streets of Karachi. Out of that only 10 percent are said to put into designated spots due to lack of adequate facility in the mega city. Our attitude of “use and discard” is leading us to make the situation worse day by day.

We have been hearing and reading for a quite long period about how bad polythene shopping bag is for our environment. But the reason why any campaign against polythene shopping bags remains largely marginalized is because most of us believe that there are very few practical alternatives in sight.

The ability of this seemingly benign stuff to create environmental disasters is enormous. It chokes gutters, drains and marine outfalls, creating a nightmare for public sanitation. It adds a lethal bite to the act of feeding, ending up in the bellies of fish, and terrestrial scavengers, like cows and dogs, who eat the leftovers that we discard after wrapping in polythene bags. Polythene bag has been making a lot of news in the recent past in the country for all the wrong reasons. Various NGOs have been seeking the ban of polythene shopping bags because of the devastating consequences of their indiscriminate use. It poses a grave threat to both the environment and human health.

A research on polythene conducted by the Korean institute of health research, said polythene-wrapped fish and meat generate a kind of heat that creates radiation which ultimately makes the food poisonous. Besides, the polythene-wrapped meat and vegetables get infected by anaerobic bacteria. a germ responsible for skin disease and cancer.

The colour used in polythene bags is also a threat to public health. The most dangerous feature of plastic is its toxicity with black coloured polythene bags the worst offenders. Although the government has banned black plastic bags around a decade ago because of their severe toxicity but still we have to go a long way before all type of shopping bags are completely banned in the country.

There is no disputing the fact that the reason polythene bags have become an indispensable part of our lives, as in certain applications they have an edge over conventional materials. Cheap and capable of carrying reasonable weight polythene bags came with so many user-friendly qualities that even subsequent to the understanding of its ill-effects, it is hard to get rid of it. Telling people simply to stop using plastic bags will not work unless you provide an alternative.

Of course, it is the cost factor, which makes using polythene bags an attractive option. Plastics are the poor man’s alternative. Shopkeepers who try to shift to greener alternatives like recycled paper bags are often forced to give it up because of the cost involved - a paper bag costs five times as much as a plastic one.

In order to tackle the problems of environmental degradation caused by polythene bags, measures will have to be taken in well intentioned phase-wise initiatives. The imposition of ban will have to be preceded by an awareness creation campaign.

Ultimately, not much can be achieved unless there is an understanding at the grass roots level, of the harm that shopping bags are causing to our environment. Non-biodegradability is of course a difficult issue to explain, particularly to the uneducated.

For anybody who cares about the future of our environment, plastic shopping bag is a powerful adversary. It is hoped that health and environmental nuisance of polythene bags would soon be removed by a suitable substitute after June 2004. Reusable shopping bags of cloth or palm mate provide a simple and affordable way for us to make our environment clean and sustainable.