Wednesday, July 01, 2020

baby steps


Starting today in Japan, plastic shopping bags will cost at least 1 yen (I have seen some shops say they will charge 4 or 5 yen, there was even a shop that was going to charge 15 yen).

This is to decrease the amount of plastic in our garbage.

Apparently though, if your plastic bag is made from 25% or more biomass, you don't have to charge for the bag...of course, a lot of businesses are trying to get on board with this type of bag...I personally don't think they should allow this type of bag, and should go "cold turkey".

Supermarkets in the past would give you 2 or more points on your point card as an incentive to bring your own bags, but I think with this new charge rule, they will probably do away with the point incentive.

I am trying to "train" Satoshi to carry a bag around with him too because he will pay for a bag rather than carry one around.

Me, I'm a penny pincher when it comes to bags and have used washable shopping bags for awhile now, so I am not too worried but will have to remember to carry more than one when going out.

Are you washing your shopping bags?  I wasn't but with COVID-19 I now wash them along with the handkerchief mask that I use that day.

During our "lockdown" I only went to the grocery store once a week but now go three times a week.

With this new plastic bag rule, I hope it will make a difference as to the amount of plastic in our garbage.

9 comments:

  1. Right now most places do not allow you to bring your reusable shopping bags here Kat. And the ones that do will not bag your groceries and will not touch your bags.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Whole Foods here won't even let you bring a re-usable bag in their store as a precaution that you may be carrying some contaminated bags. Their's a guy stationed at the door telling people they have to leave their bags outside. Weird.
    v

    ReplyDelete
  3. As your readers are commenting, we're also not allowed to bring reusable bags to stores due to the possibility of contamination.Now,plastic bags are free. Before the pandemic we'd get charged 10 cents bag but I (myself being an extreme penny pincher) always made sure to bring our own cloth bags but hubby would always "forget" (even though we kept seven bags in the trunk of our car) whenever he went shopping alone...🙄
    Take good care, Kat!
    sc reader

    ReplyDelete
  4. Until recently Safeway wasn't allowing you to bring in your own bags so were packing the groceries in their own paper bags free of charge. They've since allowed you to bring in your own bags, but now I've got a whole bunch of paper bags. I've been cutting them down to a smaller size that's more convenient to use. I think I'll do a tutorial. LOL.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Most stores are not allowing resusable shopping bags. Interesting that they sell them though. I just have them put my groceries back in the cart and bag them at my car. I don't wash the bags after each shopping trip, but we lay them out in the sun for a few days and let them get some UV disinfection.

    ReplyDelete
  6. It's probably a good idea to not bring in "eco" bags in these times. However the policies vary greatly locally in Hawaii.

    Nijiya and Whole Foods stop short of not letting you in with a bag but will at least give you a paper bag without charge. I believe places like Donki and Foodland still charge for bags. So bring a bag, don't bring a bag? Mixed messages.

    I've been carrying a canvas bag with me (one of the many hotel year-end omiyage) when I go out for almost any reason since before the plastic bag ban. I'd prefer my backpack but Donki and Walmart make you put it in a locker which just bugs the hell outta me so I'm OK with lugging all my stuff in the canvas bag. I haven't been turned away completely yet at Whole Foods/Nijiya yet but bracing myself for the eager pedant at the front door...

    ReplyDelete
  7. Kirk, in Japan we have to bag our own groceries.

    That is interesting V!

    10 cents is quite a lot for a bag, SC, hopefully we all will be able to use reusable bags soon :)

    looking forward to your tutorial, Jalna :)

    That is interesting that they sell them Vickie!

    Very mixed messages Saburo.

    Take care everyone!
    Kat

    ReplyDelete
  8. no plastic in Italy and since you bag your own stuff, BYO is allowed. I get the extra points only if going through the cashier (we rarely do ever since the scanner system was implemented). there still is, however, the plastic disposable gloves!

    ReplyDelete
  9. some stores have limited the amount of plastic produce bags you can take when bagging, Rowena, you should have seen some of those grandmas, taking them like toilet paper!

    Take care!
    Kat

    ReplyDelete

We appreciate your comments, we don't appreciate spam. All comments will be looked over. Hurtful, rude or ones that link to advertisements will be deleted.
Thanks for stopping by!