With her grandson in tow, granny Zhao Hanlian set out to a nearby farm produce fair. Then she remembered that she had forgotten something and hurried back gasping to her fourth-storey home -- not her glasses nor money, but a cloth bag.

Over the past month, the 65-year-old housewife in central China's Henan Province has made sure that she carries a cloth bag whenever she goes shopping.

"Here are your yams," said a peddler nimbly loading six of them into granny Zhao's cloth bag in the downtown market at Zhengzhou, the capital city of Henan. For the past month, peddlers on the market have not supplied free plastic bags because of a new decree in China.

Leaving the farm produce fair, granny Zhao turned off to a nearby chemist's for some cough medicine for her grandson. A salesgirl put the medicines in a paper bag -- no free plastic bag either.

"It is really inconvenient if I forget to bring a bag with me," said Zhao, who has enjoyed the convenience of free plastic shopping bags for more than a decade.

From June 1, all Chinese retailers, including supermarkets, department stores and grocery shops, have been banned from providing free plastic shopping bags because of their damage to the environment. China has also banned the production of ultra-thin plastic bags, thinner than 0.025 millimeters.

"It doesn't matter how much a plastic shopping bag costs. What matters is our sense of environmental protection," Zhao said.

Changing people's habit has proved effective, particularly in large cities, where customers often carry their own bags when shopping.

Large supermarkets in Zhengzhou have reduced the use of plastic bags by 80 percent, said Jian Hui, the Erqi outlet of Beijing Hualian supermarket group in Zhengzhou.

According to an estimate from the National Development and Reform Commission, the country's top economic planner, every two people would consume at least one plastic bag per day before June 1. At least 1,300 tons of oil must be consumed every day to produce enough plastic shopping bags to satisfy supermarket demand alone.

"Plastic bags are difficult to degrade," said Men Xiaowei, an official with the Ministry of Commerce. "The plastic waste accounted for more than 3 percent to 5 percent of the daily waste, most of which came from plastic bags."

Ultra-thin plastic bags still used

Despite the admirable results in large cities and big supermarkets, farm produce fairs and small grocery shops by and large continue offering ultra-thin plastic bags to housewives who like their little perks.

At 5:00 PM, June 29, Chen Yinhu, a housewife, went to buy some peaches at a grocery shop at the southern end of Maoming Road, east China's Shanghai City. At the cashier, the clerk handed over a red ultra-thin plastic bag.

"Is there any thicker bag?" asked Chen.

"No," replied the clerk bluntly.

"Doesn't the plastic bag ban forbid us from using ultra-thin bags?"

"We can use them here," replied the clerk lightly.

Ultra-thin plastic bags are also still in use in a food market in Yuyao Road, Shanghai.

Wang Li, who lives near Yuyao Road, would carry a few ultra-thin plastic bags home from generous stall keepers every day. She would have a plastic bag, even when she buys only one cucumber.

"I must give away free bags to keep frequent customers," said a stall keeper surnamed Xia.

Free thicker plastic bags may also be available for some buyers. On Sunday, Wang Li bought a watermelon at a large grocery shop at Yuyao Road. Before she could bring out the bag she had with her, the clerk had put the melon in a fairly thick plastic bag. When Wang asked about the price for the bag, the clerk said "free".

Hand-torn plastic bags favored

In contrast to farm produce fairs, large supermarkets strictly obey the free plastic bag ban, for fear of being fined by market regulators.

However, thrifty housewives have found they can get free plastic bags in the supermarket on the meat, seafood and cake counters. These plastic bags, largely rolled in bundles, may be torn apart by customers themselves (and are called hand-torn plastic bags), when they come to buy these cooked, uncooked food or cakes.

On June 29, Hu Yue, a nurse, went to the Carrefour outlet at Chongwenmen, downtown Beijing, and found that hand-torn plastic bags at the fruit and vegetable counter were very popular. Many consumers would tear one or two more bags than they needed, fold and hide them in shopping trolleys, "to be used as rubbish containers at home", as many confessed.

"Sorry, we do not have any large hand-torn plastic bags now," said a sale promotion staff at the rice and flour counter. "You may put the rice in two smaller bags," the sales girl suggested to Hu, who planned to buy some unpacked rice.

Similar stories took place at the Letian-mart supermarket, also at Chongwenmen. "In the past, consumers would first put seafood and meat in hand-torn plastic bags and put them into free plastic shopping bags at the cashiers. Now that the plastic shopping bag ban is being carried out, most people will not use charged plastic bags," said a staff surnamed Li from the supermarket.

"The charged plastic bags are less in demand, but hand-torn bags are used at least 30 percent more than last month," said Li.

Are they really environment friendly?

With regard to charged-for plastic bags in supermarkets, people are wondering if they are really environment-friendly.

On June 7, Yu Yurong bought about US$30 worth goods at the Huayuan outlet of Beijing Hualian Supermarket Group, the largest supermarket in northwest China's Xining City. She had to buy two large plastic bags at the cashier to load the goods, at 0.3 yuan for each plastic bag.

"It is all right to buy the plastic bags. But I am wondering if the bags are really environment friendly," said Yu.

Trade insiders say that plastic bags available on the markets are largely separated into the three types of common plastic bags, degradable plastic bags and starch-based plastic bags. Standardized plastic bags sold in supermarkets after the June 1 ban illustrate what types the bags are at bag corners.

The bags Yu bought were labeled as "shopping plastic bag", apparently the common type. Trade insiders said that since the "free shopping plastic bag ban" does not compel businesses to use degradable ones, most supermarkets choose common plastic bags to save costs.

"Common plastic bags are hard to degrade. They need more than 200 years to perish naturally when buried deep," said Zhou Ming, manager of Xining Garbage Processing Company.

In comparison, degradable plastic bags and starch-based plastic bags would wither away much faster and become more environment-friendly.

However, the latter two have their own defects. Degradable plastic bags would only split and pulverize plastics earlier than the common type. Degraded plastic molecules would integrate with soil as well, reducing farming outputs. Starch-based plastic bags could make only a "semi-degradation", a hidden source of white pollution, said Zhou Ming.

"Money will not buy environment protection. Plastic bags meeting with the 'free plastic bag ban' are not necessarily equal to environment-friendly bags. To truly protect the environment, we'd better pick up cloth bags and bamboo baskets," said Zhou Ming.

Province-wide thorough ban

Southwest China's Yunnan Province will set a model for the country in truly protecting the environment in this respect, as it is planning stricter rules on the use of plastic bags.

The provincial government has announced a definite ban on the production, sales and use of all plastic bags across the province, no matter of they are thicker or thinner than the 0.025 mm threshold, from January 1 next year.

The ban means that on the first day of next year, no plastic bags will be available in all supermarkets, department stores, shopping outlets, hotels, restaurants and service sites in the province. Businesses will instead offer truly environment-friendly shopping bags, either free or charged.

The confidence of Yunnan to go ahead with the thorough ban is largely associated with its practices in Shangri-La and Lijiang, two scenery areas in the province, which had fully banned the use of plastic bags for a few years, industry officials said.

In 2001, Shangri-La, also known in some guidebooks by its old name Zhongdian, the most beautiful and unstained place in northwest Yunnan, forbid the use of plastic bags. It became the first place in the country to ban plastic bags.

"During the past seven years, the most difficult thing for us is to find out proper substitutes," said Losang Chagxi, the environment protection bureau chief of Shangri-La County.

When the thorough ban was first introduced, stall keepers tried to use newspapers to wrap meat and bean curds sold at farm produce fairs. When they returned home, buyers were annoyed to see their bean curds were left with the clear imprint of newspapers. The county also tried to persuade users to put vegetables in bamboo and straw stalk woven baskets, but people found it inconvenient to take along either.

The county eventually found out the best way -- to promote reusable and degradable bags.

The county had thousands of degradable bags produced in east China's Zhejiang and Jiangsu provinces, offered for free to residents.

However, these substitutes were either too weak to support heavy goods or too costly. The county is exploring new ways to settle the substitute issue.

"This shows the most essential problem is technical preparation rather than mental preparation of the residents," said Gong Weibin, a sociologist with the National Academy of Administration in Beijing.

Chen Minyuan, a retired professor with Kunming Technology University, recently wrote a letter to the Kunming municipal government, proposing to borrow the practices of east China's Jiangsu Province and Shanghai to promote environment-friendly 100 percent biodegradation plastic bags in the transition period in the second half of the year to replace existing plastic bags.

"In this way, residents will not suffer from inconvenience from the thorough ban. It will also turn Kunming into a production base of degradable plastic bags, creating promising business opportunities," said Chen.

(Xinhua News Agency July 2, 2008)