Every year between 500,000 million and a trillion plastic bags are consumed in the world, according to various estimates. This massive use – every minute, a million at least – carries various environmental impacts.
One of the most worrying is that produced in the oceans, where it has a devastating effect on marine flora and fauna , according to the NGO Surfrider Europe, which carries out campaigns to collect such waste. According to a study published in the journal Science last year, if they were placed along the shores of the Earth, there would be five bags filled with plastic every 30 cm.
Concern about these wastes has been increasing in recent years – there is even the International Bag Free Day, which is celebrated every July 3 -, and various laws and campaigns have been launched to reduce its use and its environmental consequences. .
In Spain it has gone from using more than three hundred disposable bags per inhabitant and year in 2008 to 106 in 2013, according to the latest data available from Cicloplast, a non-profit organization to promote the prevention and recycling of plastics. Those responsible for this organization remember that citizens can deposit the bags in the yellow container .
