The only means through which a reasonable and lively environmental policy can be achieved in the area of a clean environment void of waste shopping bags that litters the whole land mass of planet earth and as a result of the course of nature, find their ways into water bodies is to replace plastic shopping bags with biodegradable ones.

A survey was supposed to be carried out, principally in search of the dirtiest place on earth, going by the world’s continents; Africa, Asia, Australia and Oceania, Europe, North and Central America, and South America. Of course, except for Antarctica, it will be an immature approach to things if I should go ahead to pick a continent out of the selected ones. The fact still remains that, all over the world, virtually every country has an affinity with dirt littering its water bodies or land mass, no exemption not even Switzerland the once named “cleanest country” in the world nor Hawaii, an outlying state in the USA, once acclaimed and still is the state with the “cleanest air”. A report once claimed that worldwide, about 100,000 mammals, birds and fish die as a result of eating or being suffocated by discarded or used plastic bags.

Now to the mainstream of my postulations, plastic shopping bags come in varieties and sizes, some are used to carry goods, some come in form of pure water sachet, some as cellophane nylon bags for multi-purpose usage, the usefulness is endless. But what happens when it becomes useless, sure it is thrown away to the dustbins. Considering the above painted picture, about 70% of used plastic bags worldwide is not properly disposed off. Nigeria, a country I came from can be taken as my case study. I would have loved to start from shopping bags and the likes but for the sake of uniqueness and peculiarity, let me limit my discussion to our “pure water packs or sachets”. In fact, the menace of these plastic disposables in our metropolis, you talk of Lagos, Kano, Onitsha, Port Harcourt, Kaduna, Akure etc is staggering. Lagos happens to be the most badly impacted, as these sachets have taken over every available space due to poor disposal system, our drainage systems, streets, highways, enclosures, open spaces, residential areas and even commuter vehicles all play host to these plastic disposables. A major problem they constitute to the metropolis is the issue of flooding, since these block most waterways. Obviously, during rainfall the whole metropolis will be flooded and that is the exact picture of Lagos during raining reason. Being a non-perishable waste, that remains intact for more than 20 years unlike perishable ones that decompose off the surface of the earth within 2 – 3 months, then the issue of plastic bags should be considered a critical issue.

In my own candid opinion, a vote for biodegradable substitutes can reverse this menace for the better. How do I mean? Biodegradable bags may feel like plastic when held in the hand, but they are actually made from tapioca starch and will decompose within 3 – 4 months. At least, the cost is comparable to normal plastic bags. These would curb the carnage to wildlife and menace to our environment. Personally, I would love to see a world that will stand up tall to phase out plastic bags by the year 2005, indeed this is possible after all it is for the sake of our world. The question now is, which one do you vote for, plastic or biodegradable materials? Your vote will either prove whether you are truly an environmentalist or not.


-‘Tope Akintola
tomakint2002@yahoo.com