Having lived in Argentina now for almost four years, one of the things that still strikes me is the amount of plastic rubbish that covers the landscape. Seeing people throw their rubbish onto the ground when it is no longer wanted is still hard for me witness. The plastic bags are not normally in this category however, and most are used in the home as rubbish bags to contain other trash.
The myriads of plastic bags across the landscape therefore seems to be inexplicable. The only thing that I can consider a reasonable explanation is that the dogs that roam the streets, and there are many dogs roaming the streets, tear up the bags looking for food and the wind blows them off. With a landscape covered in thornbushes, these bags end up impaled on a thorn or two and remain there until they finally start to fall apart.
Although plastic bags were a great idea at first, their effect on the environment has long outweighed any cost or convenience and it is time to ban them from our lives. There are already some cities in Argentina that have banned their use, and many others around the world have done so for some time. There are many better alternatives that we need to use now. Let’s do it.
