Plastic Bags, Green the Gene, and YOU !by | 04-11-2014 00:36 |
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Plastic Bags, Green the Gene, and YOU ! All of us at TUNZA Eco-Generation are very keen environmentalists and so definitely know about the harms and the damage that plastic bags, especially the ones used for grocery shoppings, do to our ecosystems and most importantly to us. In this article I share the story of a Green the Gene campaign that took place simultaneously in New Delhi, India and Nairobi, Kenya, which got extremely intensive at both the locations but ended up with an excellent outcome and even the passing of a legal resolution. Aiming for a Plastic bag free Delhi: We held rallies and demonstrations, and held parallel campaigns in Delhi, India and Nairobi, Kenya. Green the Gene achieved a tremendous amount of help and support from the shop owners, sales people, consumers, and even the government. What we accomplished: These efforts bore fruit and after days of relentless campaigning, petitioning, writing letters, here is an important Victory, due to the continued hard work of Green the Geners and volunteers across Haryana, India whose continuous hard work and efforts got the supermarket chain "SRS Value Bazaar" to put a complete stop on using plastic bags for groceries ! That is 19 stores not using plastic, but an innovative alternative. These effort combined with constant lobbying of the government, petitions to the Chief Minister of Delhi resulted in this. The Delhi Cabinet on Monday, 4th April,2011 approved a blanket ban on manufacture,sale,storage and usage of plastic bags under Section-5 of the Environment (Protection) Act,1986. Delhi Authorities, were instructed to strictly enforce this ban, applying to all plastic bags and those involved in their manufacturing and distribution. In Nairobi, our campaigns also yielded a similarly excellent result, though we are still striving to achieve a complete ban on these by the government. Other results, thanks to the incessant campaigning by the very dedication Green the Gene volunteers led to results such as supermarkets converting to a very innovative replacement to plastic bags- a fully compostable 100% starch carry bag. First used by the supermarket chain SRS. |
