Vancouver councillor Tim Stevenson plans to introduce a motion at Tuesday's council meeting that would ask staff to investigate options to phase out plastic shopping bags.

Paul Richard, the chair of Kwantlen College's Environmental Protection Technology Program, said a move to reusable cloth bags would help the environment without extra cost to the merchants.
 
"It's very convenient and for the merchants … You have a walking placard for advertising. I don't see a downside here for the merchants," said Richard.

It's a step already taken in San Francisco, London, Paris, and Leaf Rapids, Man.

And at least one B.C. merchant has already made the move voluntarily. Earlier this month, a Real Canadian Superstore on Vancouver Island stopped using plastic grocery bags, becoming the first store in the province to do so.

"If … they provide the consumer with cloth carry bags, then you get something the customer keeps bringing, no different from what everybody overall does in Europe," said Richard.

It's not the first time plastic shopping bags have been targeted in British Columbia.

The District of Tofino voted to ban plastic bags in May 2007, but asked residents and business owners to comply with the ban voluntarily since no bylaw was passed to enforce a ban.

And North Vancouver councillor Janice Harris proposed a $0.25 plastic bag tax at the meeting of the Union of B.C. Municipalities in 2006.