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I moved from Oregon to Ireland for a couple of years starting in 2003 and I was impressed about the whole plastic bag ban. Coming from an environmentally aware place, I was surprised we hadn't done that already given the bottle bill. I was told, by friends in Ireland, that almost overnight people started carrying their own bags to the market. If you forgot, you could get a small plastic bag for about 15 cents. I don't ever remember seeing paper bags. However, some stores had empty boxes you could take and use (a la Costco) for free.

I don't think banning plastic carrier bags is enough. People will just shift to paper if it is offered. We need to encourage people to bring their own multi-resuable bags to shop. Banning or a fee is sometimes the only way because people can be very self-interested and lazy.

Thank you,

posted 3 years, 3 months ago
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