Uni students ban plastic bags (From The Argus)

Uni students ban plastic bags

9:40am Tuesday 12th June 2007 in News By Andy Chiles

Students have stolen a march on the supermarkets by initiating a total ban on harmful plastic bags from campus shops.

While firms like Sainsburys, Tesco and Asda have tried to prove their green credentials by selling or giving reusable bags to their customers, the University of Sussex Students' Union has gone one better.

It has removed all environmentally damaging plastic bags from its three shops at the university and will charge students if they want to have any bags at all.

The union hopes the move will encourage students to reuse bags and stop them from being unnecessarily wasteful.

Customers will now have to pay 10p to buy a biodegradable plastic bag at the union's shops or can opt for a thicker 20p "bag-for-life" which can be replaced free of charge once it wears out.

The initiative is part of a wider campaign by the union to transform Sussex into an eco-uni.

Student union president Dan Glass said: "Bit by bit eco-uni is revolutionising environmental interest and action on campus.

"Every small step such as banning plastic bags across the union's outlets can make a massive difference in reducing the education sector's appalling ecological footprint and encouraging awareness where before there was next to no interest whatsoever."

Plastic bags around clothing sold in the shops will be gradually be replaced by paper ones.

The union said it had taken action following an increasing number of requests from customers at the shops.

It said minimal effort would now be needed to use recycled bags at Union News, Union Store and Union Shop.

Mr Glass said the next move it was planning was to remove all bins from the students' union and replace them with recycling points for glass, paper, cans, plastics and general waste. He said similar moves at other universities had been successful.

He added: "The purpose is to not only revolutionise the University of Sussex's environmental performance but also to set an example to the rest of the education sector, in doing all things possible to cut carbon emissions and halt global warming."

Do any of your local shops run similar schemes? Would you like them to? Have your say below.