from http://www.aolnews.com/2010/12/31/italy-bans-plastic-bags-in-2011/ by Lauren Frayer
Zunino Celotto, Getty Images. "Italy, which uses more than 20 billion plastic bags a year, is starting 2011 with a ban on the non-biodegradable bags.
"Starting Saturday, Italians will have only one answer to the question, "Paper or plastic?"
"Shops and supermarkets across Italy are doling out their last plastic bags today, before a nationwide ban forces them to swap plastic for more environmentally friendly paper or fabric bags.
"Italy is Europe's biggest consumer of plastic bags, using more than 20 billion annually.
"Every year each Italian uses 400 plastic bags, and Italy in total is responsible for 25 percent of all plastic bags that are used and produced in Europe," Eva Alessi, a spokeswoman for the World Wildlife Fund, told Euro News.
"The new ban on plastic bags has been phased in gradually since 2006, when Italian lawmakers first approved the measure. But an original deadline of January 2010 was postponed because of opposition from industry groups, who complained that the ban could create chaos in supermarkets and hurt local plastics manufacturers.
"The full ban will now go into effect on Saturday. It requires all retailers to offer customers only special biodegradable plastic bags, or ones made of paper or fabric. The emphasis is on reusable bags, which the Italian government is promoting as fashionable as well as earth-friendly.
"Sponsored LinksSupporters of the law say plastic bags use too much oil to manufacture and take decades to break down in landfills. The Italian environmental group Legambiente estimates that the plastic bag ban will save Italy 180,000 tons of CO2 emissions, according to The Daily Telegraph.
"This marks a key step forward in the fight against pollution, and it makes us all more responsible in terms of recycling," Italy's environment minister, Stefania Prestigiacomo, told Agence France-Presse.
"Other European cities have implemented similar measures, but Italy's is believed to be the first nationwide ban on plastic bags on the continent. Many countries charge customers for plastic bags."
I can't find it, but on our holiday we had SKY for a few days, including the Discovery Channel with its assortment of Discovery shows. There was the most amazing video segment I have ever seen. There was a man, who was talking about how in the city you couldn't see the horizon. He had an eagle. There were clips of the city he lived in, and plants growing in between all the buildings sped up, showing nature trying to reclaim the city. I wish I had the video! "What is a city but an attempt to exclude nature?" was one quote. He spoke about nature always trying to restore the balance, v.s. the way that people lived, and that one day it would succeed. It ended by saying his job was a "conservation biologist".
He said it so much more strongly, but I've always felt this as well! Yay for the spiritual awakening the world is experiencing.
Do you trust that people will be able to handle the responsibility of the great power of aging, and dying? I happened to come across a talk by Dr. Cynthia Kenyon, in video below (but different talk).
Basically, Dr. Cynthia Kenyon (Professor of Biochemistry and Biophysics at the University of California at San Francisco) has experimented scientifically with simpler life forms, one species worms in particular, and has isolated two genes which control aging. The worms she used have under 1000 cells in total, their lifespan is 2 weeks, and they are transparent (C. elegans, a very small roundworm about the size of a comma). The genes present in the worms are also present in us (and in fruit-flies she also uses, and in mice).
My summary: DAF-2 causes aging by inhibiting the good work done by DAF-16. DAF-16's role is to repair, etc, accessing genetic material in the nucleus of cells. DAF-2 represses DAF-16 which causes aging. Damaging DAF-2, she has discovered the fountain of youth by discovering the gene which inhibits the repairing "youth" gene, DAF-16. The worms she experimented on not only lived six times longer when DAF-2 was damaged, they also resisted great injury, and illness. The common illnesses of "old age", that a weakened organism will get, cancer, alzheimer's, heart disease were also not experienced. The implications were that we may be able to control the DAF-2 gene in humans (which is called something else, will look it up, possibly transcribe the entire talk), and then the DAF-16 gene already present in us would be able to do its good work and keep us youthful and strong alot longer. If old age were no longer present, we would go on fit and healthy until we expired, due to DNA mutations over time. Or we could get hit by a bus.
One man (with asmart jacket apparently, according to the host) had a smart question as well, about why nature hadn't already created a life-form which used this power to keep organisms young and healthy for longer. Now that was a good question. Dr. Kenyon's answer was that for one, the parent, once they had had their offspring, would be better gone as they competed with the children for resources (very relevant to humans). The other is that, perhaps a stronger worm was not necessary, as it was usually to be killed by a predator after a certain length of time.
My thoughts: When she initially spoke, I noticed that she spoke with passion for the science of what she was doing-- passion for what she was discovering in life. At the same time, I noticed the classic disconnection of this scientific age of the intuitive awareness of the impact of her actions on the world.
Of course the discussion did come around to that. I was listening to a talk by Dr. Cynthia Kenyon on the radio the first time; I could hear awareness in the British professor host, concern for the implications of the research in his tone. He asked about the "social implications" of her work (meaning the impact on people). She first said that she was a scientist, stating the usual disclaimer of her field-- implying that the responsibility for her work was held by someone else specialized to make ethical choices. I ran into this separation all the time in university, by science in particular, my biology textbook stated in the very beginning that it answered only scientific questions, and other questions were reserved for a philosophy class. But when you are talking about deep things such as death, life, and so on, how can these be separated?
Her first personal response was to acknowledge that the Earth's resources were already suffering due to the pressures of overpopulation. Then she followed by saying that in China, where there are also thinking and feeling humans, they manage to use the 1 child policy. The host mentioned that it hadn't been such a great success before turning to questions from the students. I know that in China, there are many problems such as having to kill nearly term babies, or even that there are less girls, because they need a boy to carry on the family name-- so many girl babies are aborted. And the Chinese are sad about only ever being able to have one child.
Shane summed it up succinctly, as always (my husband), when he said that she was just going to carry on her work, and leave it to others to tell people to only have 1 child.
The hose suggested that it could be a solution to choose to not develop this science. Dr. Cynthia Kenyon was thrilled about the implications of her work, and said that although some countries would ban it, there would always be others who would be interested. (So it was going to go forward.)
Dr. Kenyon's thrill about discovering nature was not wrong in itself, but it is the lack of using the whole mind, and conscience, in particular the neglected intuitive mind, that creates a monstrous imbalance. If were were a society which appropriately managed our greater powers, distributing wealth and resources, and also could manage our impact on the environment, this new power could be considered. But are not managing ourselves at all-- that would require intuitive powers of balance. How can we pull the strings of nature even more without listening to her lessons also of balance? We learn what we wish to, and use it how we wish. It is really frightening.
A few days later:
You can't just think in a bubble - like Dr. Cyntha Kenyon with her anti-aging discoveries. Yes, nature is a marvel, but are you adding to the problem, or the solution in our world? Dr. Cynthia has essentially discovered a way to make overpopulation worse on our planet- there was a reason nature had struck that balance. Akinori Ito has used his life and abilities to help the world in which he has found himself.
PS - about anti-aging science and the whole science love affair in general, who wants to have power and control over everything? Then it no longer manages itself, it is just taking on more that we have to now manage and maintain ourselves. Our heart and many body functions currently operated autonomously. Taking over something that is currently managed by Nature is similar to saying No, I want to manage the beating of my heart consciously from now on.
Reported at http://www.care2.com/causes/environment/blog/mexico-city-bans-plastic-bags/
"Earlier this week, Mexico City became the second largest metropolis in the Western Hemisphere to outlaw the distribution of plastic shopping bags.
"Hailed as one of the fastest ways to cut down on solid waste, the new ordinance will affect thousands of retail stores and almost 19 million people living in the district and surrounding communities that make up greater Mexico City.
"In good circumstances, high-density polyethylene will take more than 20 years to degrade. In less ideal circumstances (landfills or as general refuse), a bag will take more than 1,000 years to degrade, according to Reusit.com.
"Mexico City is just one more in an ever-growing list of large urban areas banning plastic bags, which are costly to produce, environmentally destructive, and toxic when buried in a landfill.
"In March of 2007, San Francisco enacted an ordinance that gave supermarkets six months and large chain pharmacies about a year to phase out the bags. Los Angeles is set to impose a similar ban if the state of California does not enact a statewide 25-cent fee per bag by July.
"Around the world, plastic bags are either completely banned or significantly taxed in: South Africa, Eritrea, Rwanda, Somalia, Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, several cities in India, China, Ireland, Italy, Belgium, Switzerland, Germany, and Holland. Both the United Kingdom and Australia are considering similar measures.
"People who might like to recycle their plastic bags find that they are unable to mix them in with normal curbside materials. In many cases, bags can be recycled at the store from which they originated, but many doubt that these actually make it to a recycling facility.
"Although recycling bags is on the rise in the United States, an estimated 90 billion thin bags a year, most used to handle produce and groceries, go unrecycled (McClatchy)."
from http://www.care2.com/causes/environment/blog/marin-county-looking-to-ban-plastic-bags/
"Editor's Note: The wonderful trend continues, as more and more cities have put bans on plastic bags in place, and other areas follow suit. This post originally appeared on Plastic Pollution Coalition.
"On January 4th, the Marin County Board of Supervisors will vote on a single-use bag ordinance. While it’s certainly not the first of such ordinances to be considered, particularly in California, it is unique in one important way: Marin County plans to rely on a categorical exemption to CEQA (click here for more info) and not prepare an Environmental Impact Report (EIR).
"The City of Oakland attempted a similar approach last year and lost a lawsuit challenging its ordinance on the grounds that it had not done an EIR. In Oakland’s case, however, the city’s bag ordinance simply banned plastic bags.
"Marin County’s ordinance includes a ban on plastic carryout bags and 5-cent charge on paper bags. County supervisors believe that by imposing a charge on paper bags in addition to banning plastic bags, the ordinance neutralizes the argument that if consumers just switch to paper it can be as bad or worse for the environment than plastic, and thus also bypasses the need for an EIR.
"Since most cities and counties view EIRs as a mandatory part of passing a bag ban, and the reports can potentially cost tens (or hundreds) of thousands of dollars for each municipality, other cities will be closely watching what happens in Marin. No doubt the American Chemistry Council will be watching as well. "
"Jonny Hannah was born & bred in Dunfermline, in the kingdom of Fife. He studied illustration at Liverpool Art School, where he was taught by the legendary Peter Bailey, & then The Royal College of Art. Since he graduated in 1998, he has constantly worked as an illustrator in most fields." (from http://www.imagesofdelight.com/client.asp?id=87)
One thing I notice, besides the "don't excite your emotions" too much thing is that it's only when you humble yourself that you really are able to do good work. The moment you say to yourself, "I am so awesome", it all goes out the window.
If you are blind with ego and imagine yourself to be powerful, then you are not able to align your true weak human abilities to the powers of nature. Once you connect with the task as yourself, a faltering human, I think, then you are able to listen for some of those ways nature uses, and in using them as well, find strength.
detail of landscape in larger artist impression I am working on
