Chinese Cities to Curb "White Pollution"Department stores and shopping malls in Tianjin, north China have started to provide customers with bags made from biodegradable materials.The move is to eliminate "white pollution" caused by excessive use of plastic bag and containers. "We hope the act will help arouse people's awareness of caring for our environment," said a manager with a local department store. Plastic bags and tableware became popular only a few years ago because it was cheap and convenient. Being non-biodegradable and usually reprocessed from used plastic, they carry a great deal of pathogenic bacteria and are harmful to people's health. The local government has prohibited the production and sale of traditional plastic bags and containers, primarily those used in restaurants and cafeterias, since the first day of this month. Plastic producers who violate the decree will be seriously punished. Shanghai has scheduled to cut over 40 percent of the plastic litter by the end of this year and eliminate the "white pollution" by 2005. Beijing encourages citizens to reuse durable paper bags and sort the trash according to its material for recycling. Cities in Jiangsu, Hubei, Liaoning and other provinces begin to strive against the imminent plastic disaster. For instance, Jinzhou in northeast China's Liaoning province distributed 20,000 free bamboo baskets for customers to carry goods in as an alternative to using the plastic bags. In spite of that, the biodegradable bags will not replace plastic completely at once for stores cannot bear a heavy burden and the price of new material is higher. At present, an estimated 11 million tons of plastic garbage were disposed of in China annually and the figure in the world as a whole reaches around 170 million tons every year. |
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