Who We Are And What We Are Doing

Posted on March 3, 2008
Filed under: Blog Posts |

What kicked off the campaign?

It started off as an idea that was raised in one of our monthly bloggers gatherings, as we felt that there wasn’t much awareness concerning environmental issues in Bahrain. We chose plastic bags and their dangers on our environment as a starting point because it is a topic close to home..literally!

How are you planning to raise awareness?

Blogging and the internet in general is a powerful medium to raise awareness and we have recently established a blog called ‘No More Plastic Bags‘ which is also linked from several Bahrain blogs including the Bahrain Blogs Aggregator. On the blog, bloggers and anyone concerned about the use of plastic bags can find information on the dangers of plastic bags on our environment and ideas and inspiration on how to find other environmentally friendly solutions. Readers can contribute also by writing on their personal blogs or emailing us at nomoreplasticbags@gmail.com to publish their articles or links on the blog.

We are planning to get in touch with various organizations including the UN and some of the large supermarkets and hypermarkets in the country to eventually phase out plastic bags and use environmentally friendly alternatives.

Who and how many people are taking part in the campaign?

We’re a small group of Bahrain bloggers and we are recruiting! So please join us and don’t hesitate to contact us at nomoreplasticbags@gmail.com

How are you going to fight this problem?

We need to educate people about the dangers and effects of plastic bags on our environment, and how something simple as refusing a plastic bag when buying one or two items from the cold store or supermarket can make a difference.

Reusing old plastic bags (especially when their average usage is only a mere 12 minutes before being thrown away) is also another great way to use fewer plastic bags and because they are so light-weight and do not take up much space, you can leave them in the boot of your car and take them with you into the supermarket.

We eventually would love to follow the lead of cities like Modbury, England and San Francisco, USA and countries like China, Australia, Kenya and Ireland and see plastic bags being phased out and replaced by bio-degradable materials in Bahrain.

What do you think the government and the public do to help fight this problem?

Many people in Bahrain unfortunately ‘wait’ for the government to start some sort of initiative so that they [the citizens] can start doing something about it. A problem such as this can only be solved if we start from the grassroots by reusing and refusing plastic bags.

As for what the government can do, we hope that the new recycling plant in Bahrain is equipped with a facility to recycle used plastic bags. We also believe that the government should push supermarkets to provide other alternatives to plastic bags, like cloth, paper or jute bags to give the consumer options.

Are you planning to get any public or private sectors to help in raising awareness in your campaign?

Yes, at the moment the UN representative in Bahrain has shown great interest in our campaign and we are searching for corporate sponsors to help us make and print large numbers of cloth bags to distribute at events and supermarkets.

We also are planning to get in touch with several large supermarkets and hypermarkets around the island to give out less plastic bags to shoppers (because many supermarkets seem to love bagging each and every single item in a separate plastic bag!) and to provide alternatives to their shoppers.

We would love to gain the opportunity to visit schools and talk about the effects of plastic bags on our environment, because at the end of the day, we are preserving the Earth for our future generations and children today will be the decision makers of the future.

Posted by PaperBoy


Tags: , , , , , , , , ,

Comments

Leave a Reply