I used cloth bags because we don't have the option to recycle bags here. I do agree with the plastic bag manufacturer in saying that we have to look at what is in the bag. What about all those non recyclable plastic items like computers, food packages, CDs, DVDs, teakettles, toasters, rubber tires, etc., etc., ad infinitum. Plastic bags are just the tip of the iceberg. As consumers, we have to think about everything we buy and try to reduce our footprint on the earth.

This documentary is very insightful and propels me to immediate action.

Some more pracical solutions are needed, though.For example: How to dispose of the garbage.... not everything can be recycled & put into the Blue Box, or the compost. 1.) Where can I find a bag that can safely go into the garbage. 2) the recent promotion of 'nylon-type' bags from Safeway, etc., are they environmentally safe to dispose (when the time comes)?

Almost every plastic grocery bag acquires a small rip or hole at the bottom seam, which renders the bag almost non-reusable.

As for a total ban on plastic bags putting 7,000 Canadians out of work, I say, "Buggy whips." (No one considered all the unemployed buggy whip manufacturers when the automobile replaced the horse and buggy.)

Plastic bags are NOT the problem. The problem is our runaway consumer society, hellbent on keeping up with the Jones's. It's a worldwide problem, and is now spreading to the emerging economies who all want to enjoy the excesses of North American and European society.

The impact created by bags is miniscule compared to that created by unending urban sprawl, oversized homes with oversized vehicles, all driving in gridlock to faraway workplaces or weekend cottages. Torontonians, in particular, should hang their heads in shame, as they lead the world in consuming the most resources per-capita.

If anything is to be banned, it should be the construction of any more suburbs. And a ban on being allowed to buy a new vehicle every year. And a ban on building homes larger than 2000 sq. ft.

But that wouldn't go over too well with narcissistic, self-absorb, and selfish city dwellers. So instead we appease our collective guilty consciences by making token efforts on "saving the environment".

This indeed is the classic liberal/socialist reaction to a major world problem. Ban the plastic bag while I continue to earn a big fat income, drive my big fat car, live in my big fat house, and carry on with my big fat self-indulgent life style.

it's time that Toronto bans plastic bags

I think everyone should watch this documentary....& decide what they should/could do to help! I would love to see it in our schools.

I do agree we have Too Much of Everything!!!
We can't only blame the plastic bag but to elimate them Is not a bad thing. It won't be convenient for people to always bring their own bags...but too bad, it shouldn't be about convenience. I already do the 3 R's (recycle, re-use & reduce) for years now. I have taught my children as well to. I am one household( 4 people) so I figure any others & I can make a difference & of course... the more on board the better just like any cause! Power in numbers!

If we can get it into our schools
and educate our young, that would be a Bonus!

Does anyone else find it disturbing that when the San Francisco town council makes a toast to the end of the plastic bag, they are drinking the wine out of plastic cups?

More awareness of the evils of plastic bags is a good start, but people need to then look at all of their consumer habits and cut out other non-essential wasteful purchases.

Maybe if more people speak out and talk to their friends, the anti-bag revolution will turn into an anit-plastic revolution.

This documentary is a valuable tool that should be used in our schools, business, and anywhere education is a high priority. Awareness is the key, and when we know better we do better....it will take everyone to make the change so we can make a better world for our kids and grandkids....just take a tour out to 'your' landfill, and then put your efforts to work to make it better. We are a throwaway society, and we desperately need to change, the big oil companies will change with society, never fear! They will survive!

I would strongly support a ban on all plastic bags and have everyone toting canvas bags instead. If a ban on plastic bags were not feasible I would prefer to see shop owners adopt a biodegradable bag and have consumers pay a fee for that privilege. We all must participate in protecting this planet and a ban on plstic bags would be another monumental step in the right direction.

Limiting them is a great and really important idea. There are very small in volume, and recyclable, but many are still sent to landfill where they cause a much larger hassle at the sites than their small size would have us assume. I would encourage the use of metal or other garbage storage units that could be cleaned - so we can move away from packaging our garbage. I also think paper bags or old newspaper makes better sense, because when we eventually have to clear out and deal properly with our landfills paper will be a lot easier than shredded plastics. Right now paper products are just too much more expensive for most people.

Canada is so far behind the rest of the world. The only thing that is green is the trees between us. Unfortunately so much of our economy is dependent on depleting our non-renewable resources. But there is hope...but we need to profile companies that are going green and taking market risks.

Al-Pack in New Brunswick manufacturers compostable produce bags, shopping bags, garbage bags and doggie. It is unfortunate that CBC featured a European manufacturer of compostable bags and not a Canadian one!

The plastic bag is not the enemy, recycle the damn things! If curbside recycling programs would pick up the used bags, they can easily be re processed. It takes 60% less energy to make a plastics bag vs paper bags. Used plastic bags collected for reprocessing take even less energy to make new bags again which means less natural gas is needed to make new plastic. Educate the consumer, reuse, recycle, reduce.

According to a recent article in our local newspaper a company in Barrie has invested in a German process to convert plastic bags to diesel fuel. I was surprised to find no mention of this technology in the program.

After watching this video I, too, am compeled to action. As has been asked before..what to do with the bags I already have? Not a good idea to send them to the dump soooo... I already recycle a good deal of them, but not all. I also am a small business owner who uses them for our business. How to cut them out before I find a replacement...where do I look for "bagless" bags to buy??? And of course, cost is always an issue. We are a mom & pop business who try to keep our costs down as much as possible and certainly don't have the buying power of the "Wal Marts, Sobey's, etc.". What is the "little guy" who cares supposed to do? Help!! I will cringe every time I put my customers product into one now.

Andrea: I noticed the plastic wine cups too - right up there with the woman who bought a cloth bag and having it put into a plastic bag earlier in the programme!

Anti-bag folks always talk about how goods were brought home before the plastic bag.. but what about garbage? I recycle what there are facilities to handle in my area, and compost as much as I can, but I still have to deal with some smelly trash. What are the plastic-free options for dealing with garbage?

There are some comments about how bags are a symptom of a consumer society, so maybe the solution is to move the problem back to distributors:

Let's get rid of residential trash removal services, as these allow people to ignore the problem. Let's make retailers accept used packaging - I'm sure they will be happy to pass this cost directly on to the consumer, rather than having it indirectly passed on in municipal service bills. This would put enormous pressure on manufacturers to create products that are built to last, are reparable/serviceable, and that are inexpensive to recycle.

I was deeply affected by this film. I am so saddened to see the death of those innocent animals that ate these bags.
To me this is the issue that people need to be aware of. If people knew that they were killing animals by throwing away plastic bags, maybe they would think twice about it.

Plastic bags are recylable, consumers and government should act to get them recycled.

Paper is not the answer, they use more resources to make paper bags.

Our real problem is food waste, the majority of green house gases in land fill is not from plastics, however from food.

Compostable bags are now available as are many other green solutions, however most businesses are not willing to pay more for them.

Of course, these bags should not be banned. But I have to ask why would the CBC, a news organization, include Kenya in this documentary right now? Plastic shopping bags are the least of their worries. Wouldn't it be better if the CBC covered the genocide in that country following their national elections? Is that situation under control? What is happening there? It leaves us to ponder the relevance of the CBC.

We can educate the youth not to take plastic bags all we want, they are not the decision makers nor are they running industry nor are they the prime consumers of society!!! their Parents perhaps are.

Recycling markets need to open up to be able to recycle different sorts of plastic... pure business,,not alot of markets means not alot of municipal recyclers can sell the product.

Why does not someone save and collect them until there is a buyer??

People who buy bags from stores and take a bag to put their new bag purchase in are completely unconscious of the earth in which we live. They need a wake up call! All in moderation, reduce, comes before re-use which is before recycle!

Proud to say that a neighborhood grocery store (moms&pops style) do not provide plastic bags anymore!--just their old cardboard boxes...

I recycle my bags at Loblaws here in London. A&P has let consumers recycle bags in their stores for years. They have shown real leadership on this issue. Good for A&P.

Trevor, in London

Great article for awareness. If Garbage bags were banned wouldn't that just be IDEAL!!! but in actuality we would create more waste, do more harm to the environment and habitats, and create more greenhouse gases by the use and creation of solvents, detergents, and the biggest waste of all WATER the fading fresh resource we all take for granted for cleaning and disinfecting to prevent the spread of disease and virus.

Now this is a culture barrier from back in the day when your word actually meant something instead of the neo wishywashy approach i'm not taking responsibility for that. If people took more initiative to re-use and recycle plastic bags, what is the difference of accountability? In a society where plastic is so prominant that it is in almost every non-edible item from widgits to coatings, what would posess a person to take on only plastic bags? why would someone want to be so malicious towards one topic? Sorry for the rant but "I feel plastic will serve our society as we will treat it." Name 3 species on the brink of extinction? I bet you none of them are because of plastic bags. Outta sight! Outta mind!

OPTIONS: on-site removal of plastic bags from their contents at a dump site. If we can land on the moon, we can surely invent a system or machine to decrease the amount of plastic going into our dumps and increase the amount of plastics recycling.

the problem is not really the bags themselves or recycling them or throwing them away. i asked the recycle truck guy once if i could put cellophane in the recycle. he looked at me and said" i dont care if you garbage it or put it in recycle. theres no way its going to make it to the conveyor belt. it wil get blown away."

that is the problem with bags, they are sails that fly off ito places where they can cause problems. i myself hate plastic and miss the days of coke in a glass bottle as well as other things in glass. they used to wash the bottles out like they still do with beer bottles (the only present day example i can think of)and reuse them.

i always thought why dont they make mayo, mustard, etc. jars out of glass, make them all the same shape so any company can slap their label on them (like beer bottles did 10 years ago), and slap a hefty deposit on all of these containers so people actually return them. 5 or 10 cents is a joke. my neighbor throws them out. not worth his time. and on the issue of paper bags, yes they use more energy to make but if they fly into a field they will decompose, if an animal eats them it probably will not get sick. but more energy means more air pollution. so its a toss up

What people should do is refuse to recycle, once their is a seriousness on the publics part to not recycle plastic manufacturers would be forced to go back to the bottle which is a far safer product, westerners are sheep and do what ever the powers that be dictate without a second thought to long term consequences.

Recycling is not the problem the problem is what to recycle... what sense does it make to recycle plastic and then make more containers out of plastic.

One day people will wake up and see the health risks of bottled water in plastic etc...

these discussion are pretty useless as Canadaians are made up of a bunch of whinny finger pointing citizens that contradict everything they do like the good little citizens that recycle their plastic in their little greay or blue boxes and lay them on the driveway corner right beside their 2 gas guzzling SUV's!

By the way have has anybody bothered to do the research on how much fossil fuel is burned to haul all this recycled plastic around not to mention the plants that have to run to melt down the waste plastic so that it can be molded into more plastic water bottles and bags?

I live in a city that does accept plastic bags in its Blue Box but I still almost always refuse a plastic bag when asked if I want one by the store clerk.

The one comment in the show that stood out in my mind was that from the plastics industry representaive who said that "only" 4% of the world's oil supply is used to make plstic bags - did I really hear this correctly??? I feel that 4% of a limited supply of a non-renewable reesource is a lot!

As to the comment from Zac about what to do with smelly waste: I rinse off smelly non-recyclebale garbage (of which I have VERY little - 46 litres last year) in the soap water when I do my dishes. All of my garbage goes into bags that cannot be recycled (e.g. cookie and cereal bags - no comment on my diet please!) and drop these bags into my garbage can. I once attempted to put small bits of garage into the can loose, but it flew around, littering the neighbourhood, when the collector dumped the garbage into the truck.

I finally found a company that can provide biodegradable plastic bags. I needed a supply for our promo items and wanted to order a year's supply. But I was told that the problem with biodegradable bags, is that they are biodegradable. Apparently, they don't store well. Turn into a pile of dust at the end of their short shelf life, and prior to that become pretty iffy on how much they can hold.

In Mexico 20 years ago, there were no plastic bags, people used cloth or baskets. store clerks used paper and pencils to calculate the shopping bill. Then plastic bags arrived around the same time as hand held calculaters. The locals were so proud that they were now modern.

Now plastic bags blow all over the desert snagging in cacti and end up in the stomaches of roaming ganados (livestock). While hiking in the desert I saw a dead cow's skeleton. The ribs encircled a large cavity that was entirely full of plastic layer upon layer, that never was passed out of the poor animals body.

I absolutely think plastic bags should be banned! We can remember to bring our canvas bags (or biodegradable ones) when we go shopping. Lest we forget, we can pay for one at the store to help us remember for next time. We can do this! We can survive, and would certainly thrive, without the plastic bag!

I own a health food store and would like to STOP using plastic bags, but where can I get either paper bags with handles that aren't to expense, or other alternatives?

Thanks CBC for the documentary. It is really important for us to connect with the consequences of our consumerism. This will change they way I live!

While I watched the documentary on TV, I cannot fugure out how they calculate that plastic bags last 1000 years. They don't. I have to cover over things(made of fibreglass or rubber or metal) for the wintertime to keep the snow off of them to keep the finish in good shape. I use a variety of bags, whether they be Glad garbage bags, or other bags - that is what I use.
Come the spring time, when I remove the bags, they literally fall apart in my hands. No more stretchiness, no more use as a bag. They just fall apart.
The UV rays of the sun is what does the damage to the plastic. So, I am talking 1 winter(maybe2 if the bag was not exposed to direct sunlight).
This same sunlight is what destroys paint jobs(which are plastics), lawn furniture and the like.
So the bags that last a longer period of time are those that are buried in the dirt (protected by the rays of the sun) such as in landfill garbage dumps.
It is that procedure that puts longevity into the bag. Maybe landfill procedures needs a reanalysis as to the methodology of disposing of waste.
This is what preserves a plastic bag.
No studies were made to the new type of junk/trash/waste and same methodology was applied and expecting everything to react the same way.
Who's fault is that?

guess no one ever goes out into the middle of a clear-cut and sees just what a forest looks like when it isn't there. what a bunch of propaganda crap. plastic can be disposed off safely and beneficially. it is done world wide in heating and power generating plants. Trees take room and time to grow (hundred or more years). what are those picture of trash heaps going to look like when that plastic is replaced with paper. The heaps will be there just a different material. Wake up people. we are making a huge mistake at the cost of our forests, air and water