Roger Moroney: No more plastic to put all the plastic in

Roger Moroney is an award-winning journalist for Hawke's Bay Today and observer of the slightly off-centre.

I now carry a spare pair of reading glasses in the car just in case I need them.

And always have about 50 cents rolling about in the glovebox in case I have to call in somewhere and the meters are in control of my parking destiny.

And now, I carry a cotton bag with handles on it because I may have to stop by at the supermarket.

Because they don't roll out the plastic bags any more to shove the things you had on the shopping list into.

And on the ecological and responsibility front that is a fine things, for it is the most high profile reduction of plastic items you will come across.

By virtue of the fact they were always there and you just took that farewell packing process for granted.

Now they are not, and in the immediate wake of their disappearance everybody was talking about their demise ... and accordingly making some sort of plan as to how to cart their beer, bread, chicken thighs and dunny rolls out to the car.

It has transpired, as a follow-up to the banning of plastic shopping bags, that those businesses which transgress and keep wrapping stuff in them can potentially face a fine of up to $100,000.

Crikey, that's a lot of plastic banknotes.

Accordingly, the shops have unveiled very effective carry bags for a very modest price.

Yes, some of them are plastic but they are devised to be reusable.

The oceans and landfill sites can breathe a little easier ... sort of.

I mentioned, a tad flippantly, earlier on about the sort of things you end up dropping into your reusable of habitat-friendly carry bag and it come to pass that all four of those items, come with some form of plastic wrapping attached.

And all perfectly legal apparently.

As are the bags and containers which house common staples like rice, noodles, sugar, cakes of soap, dishwashing liquid, toothpaste, spuds, salad leaves, packed meats, family pies, milk, juices, yoghurt, pizzas, pure water, pasta, cooking oil, all frozen stuff ... and that was only from wandering down half the aisles.

Oh, and large rubbish bags.

They can't give you a small packing bag but they are happy to flick off a dozen very large ones which will all get filled with half the wrappings mentioned and buried in the ground.

The landscape of plastic, if anything, is actually growing because every week I come across new items appearing on the shelves and a great majority of them are housed in plastic.

I just can't help being slightly cynical when a drop in the bucket regulatory move is made by the Government with the environmental ministry then stepping in to announce massive fines for miscreants.

Sure, it's a positive thing, but the aisles of the nation are stacked with plastic packaged stuff ... tonnes of it.

And no sign of any let-up.

If anything, it's just growing.

Because plastic is cheap to produce and work with, and easy to use for anything.

I saw the rows and rows of honey, peanut butter and other spreads all in plastic pots where once upon a time they were in glass jars.

The global recyclable market for plastic has dissolved but it's still being churned out relentlessly because basically, it is unstoppable.

Getting a shop to stop giving out shopping bags is simple ... but try negotiating with multi-billion dollar global food and drink manufacturers and distributors.

No way.

However, it is a start, albeit a very slight one, but as they say ... anything's better than nothing.

Except those throwaway shopping bags were handy to have around the place for putting stuff in.

I'll have to go and buy a packaged roll of throwaway plastic bags instead.

Plenty of those about.