Recycling?

The bottle deposit/recycling initiative will obviously take a (long) while but the plastic bag part of it should be simple enough to implement without a lot of muss and fuss.

It would probably be less expensive and better for the economy and jobs to separate and ship the waste off island than to close the existing and open new landfills.

EPA mandated the closure of the landfill.

There is already an extra fee on the import of all bottles/cans - that money goes to waste mismanagement's anti-litter and beautification fund. I think this was a chucky initiative from back in the day and look how successful that has been.

oh please let it be so. The plastic bag thing is out of control and it PAINS me to put plastic and cans in with my regular trash. PAIN.

This is from years of living in Belgium where you pay 1 euro PER TRASH BAG - they come in a roll of 10 and are sold according to your commune. Trash collectors will not take anything that is NOT in a commune bag and they will only take two per week.
Recycling requires a separate college degree. you have three different bags and everything is sorted accordingly and failure to be meticulous results in hefty fines. Grocery bags cost 10 centimes each so you bring your own reusables.

Naturally they have the systems in place to deal with this level of recycling - I don't fault the VIs, but surely there are things we can do to lessen the impact on the landfills.

We used to have an extensive recycling program in Ontario, Canada where everything was sorted for curbside pick up.

I'm all for these initiatives but the GVI doesn't have the financial or manpower resources to execute a similar initiative here. These programs cost big money to implement and I doubt the GVI has the money to even purchase the number of blue boxes required for the territory.

They can start by banning single use plastic bags and Styrofoam containers.
Place a 5¢ per can, glass bottle, plastic bottle deposit on these items paid at time of purchase and redeemable from stores that sell the items.
Vermont was doing this 40 years ago.

You already have to bring your own bags to grocery stores in the BV, so it can work. It is also a crazy mentality i see too often in gas stations, where someone will buy a can of soda or something similar and ask for a bag.....why Are they just trying to make trash? I watched a lady throw a hissy fit when she couldn't get a bag for her bag of potato chips. I find it hilarious when the attendant will tell them no.
I remember when i was a kid we used to go house to house asking for bottles to recycle for candy money.

5 cents for the 12oz and 10 cents for the 16oz bottles back in the day.

Go to Home Depot and get a single small item and they ask, would you like a bag for that? Really? Sad thing is, half the stuff from home depot will just tear a hole in the cheap plastic bags, instant trash before getting home.

We use plastic grocery bags as liners for wastebaskets. My wife uses them when she cleans the litter box - rather than use a larger plastic bag. She'll also use one, on the side, when she knows she'll be generating "smelly trash" that will need to go out sooner than the larger trash bin. We never throw one away without it serving a secondary purpose.

We use plastic grocery bags as liners for wastebaskets. My wife uses them when she cleans the litter box - rather than use a larger plastic bag. She'll also use one, on the side, when she knows she'll be generating "smelly trash" that will need to go out sooner than the larger trash bin. We never throw one away without it serving a secondary purpose.

Same here. Buy a box of small garbage bags or reuse the grocery bags? That's a no brainer.

http://stthomassource.com/content/news/local-news/2016/06/20/plastic-bag-ban-moving-forward-senate

specialk, exactly what I do too. I don't get many of them as I take my own bags with me when shopping but those I do get are always put to secondary use. I primarily use the plastic veggie bags for those "odds and ends" and litter bits. 😀

whats the difference between plastic grocery bags and plastic bags you have to buy?

and we all know plastic disintegrates down here. same as those "cloth " bags you get at the store-they disintegrate too.

why ban plastic grocery bags when we still use plastic grocery bags?

and arent plastic grocery bags recyclable ?

We use plastic grocery bags as liners for wastebaskets. My wife uses them when she cleans the litter box - rather than use a larger plastic bag. She'll also use one, on the side, when she knows she'll be generating "smelly trash" that will need to go out sooner than the larger trash bin. We never throw one away without it serving a secondary purpose.

Same here. Buy a box of small garbage bags or reuse the grocery bags? That's a no brainer.

It's a loaded question widely discussed and researched. The bottom line for me is that the bags I use, although made from recycled material, are bags that I use over and over again (I have some which are well over 5 years old and still going strong) in complete contrast to the typical plastic grocery bags which are used just once and then trashed.

My wife uses them when she cleans the litter box - rather than use a larger plastic bag.

I use brown paper lunch bags for the kitty litter. it's $3 per 100 (up here anyway) and they're bio-degradable. I used canvas bags for my groceries, so I don't generate the amount of plastic bags necessary for two thriving kittens.:-)

I rarely [and can't even remember the last time] buy boxed plastic bags for trash -- I use the free plastic bags that I accumulate from the grocery, Kmart, Main st. and elsewhere for all my needs. I use a big plastic coffee can in the kitchen lined with one for all my garbage and take it every day to avoid ants - compost a lot of what I can - add my eggshells and coffee grounds to potting soil - read newspapers on line - use big plastic containers from Ice cream for painting, wash and save large glass jars for rice, crackers, cereal, flour, bread crumbs, etc., - use the nice CostUless bags for a lot of shopping - drop aluminum cans off in SubBase for recycling - remember the days the Boy Scouts had a paper and cardboard collection program and wonder why that stopped - think lots of the tree and yard waste could be mulched and sold by an entrepreneurial person with the room to do it or any of the garden centers - feel that lots of opportunities exist that could be similar to the St John project
http://iglavi.org/what-is-resource-depot/.
It will take education and reasonably easily accessible drop off sites to make recycling work better here.
Glass can be crushed, tires can be shredded, yard waste can be mulched, cans can be crushed, bundled and shipped, oil can be refined and used for other purposes -- there are many paths to a better island with less trash in the landfill.

... wash and save large glass jars for rice, crackers, cereal, flour, bread crumbs, etc.,

I do pretty much everything you do but rather than use glass (I can be a bit of a klutz where glass is concerned!) I use those big heavy plastic ground coffee containers for all that stuff. I only drink one mug of coffee every morning but it's amazing how quickly those containers have accumulated and they're perfect - and unbreakable!