With the ban on polythene shopping bags taking effect from today, different city markets are stockpiling environment-friendly jute bags.

Bangladesh Jute Mills Corporation (BJMC) yesterday intensified its drive to sell jute bags and truckloads of its workers carrying festoons and banners raced to the city markets to drum up support for their use.

Eight jute mills under Khulna zone have gone on a jute bag production spree producing 80,000 pieces a day as polythene shopping

bags are going to be phased out across the country.

The production in the mills started following a decision at a high-profile meeting of the BJMC at its office Tuesday as the government banned production, sale and use of polythene shopping bags in capital Dhaka from Tuesday and elsewhere in the country from March 1.

Officials said the bag-producing machines of the jute mills were closed for over a year as bag export virtually remained stopped for lack of market abroad. "And those machines now have gone into operation in full swing and bag production could be raised further by overhauling the faulty ones," said an official.

Of the total, 15,000 jute bags are being produced in People's Jute Mill, 20,000 in Crescent Jute Mill, 15,000 in Platinum Jute Mill, 7,000 in Daulatpur Jute Mill, 5,000 in Alim Jute Mill, 7,000 in Star Jute Mill, 6,000 in JJI Jute Mill, 5,000 Eastern Jute Mill per day.

The bags will be supplied to BJMC Dhaka office and later jute fabrics would be supplied to the businessmen so that they themselves could produce jute bags. The BJMC is currently producing jute bags of five different sizes and selling those at prices ranging from Tk 3 to Tk 7.

Different socio-cultural and nongovernmental organisations have stuck posters on the city walls, disseminating awareness about the use of jute bags. Some cottage industries producing handicrafts came to the markets to sell various containers made of bamboo and cane.

The pro-environment decision to ban the 20-micron wafer-thin variety has been taken by the government to fight all sorts of pollution such as air pollution, solid waste pollution, soil pollution, water pollution and industrial waste pollution.

As a non-biodegradable product, polythene has already wreaked havoc on the public sanitation, not to speak of the irreparable damage its further use would bring to the life system.

Despite tremendous pressure from all sides, the cabinet at a meeting on December 23 approved of the environment ministry's proposal to ban the use and marketing of polybags in the city from January 1, 2002.

The decision has been applauded by all quarters because polythene shopping bags have proved damaging to the environment, harmful to public health and ruinous to the drainage and sewerage system in the capital in the last two decades.

Although civil society, media, environmental journalists and nongovernmental organisations have long been trying to draw attention of the authorities to the dreadful impact of the shopping polythene bag, less attention was given to its

ever-increasing use, production and marketing.

In 1994, the BNP government had taken a step and finalised the decision to ban polybags, but the move did not live up to its implementation because of the pressure from both in and outside the government. The previous Awami League government also took a move to ban polybags, but to no avail.

The use and marketing of polybags will also be banned across the country in the next two months and necessary laws are likely to be enacted in the coming session of the Jatiya Sangsad, official sources said.

It was only in mid-1982 when polythene bags came to Bangladesh, replacing other shopping bags overnight from the market. The production of polybags started in 1983 and their use and production have multiplied since. Polybags are used extensively because of their low cost and their practical utility.

According to a study by the environment ministry, around 800 polythene factories have been set up across the country with most in the capital. In 1983, there were only two polythene bag factories in the country, but the number climbed to 800, with a production capacity of about 129 million polybags a day.

Another survey of an NGO said that there were 315 to 320 factories producing thin shopping bags -each employing eight to 12 workers on average, with the workforce between 2,520 and 3,840.

However, manufacturers claimed that the number of plasticproducing factories is about 1,500 employing around 1,30,000 workers. But the survey reports by the govern-

ment and NGOs termed the claim completely false.

The ministerial survey shows that about ten million polybags are used and nine million polybags dumped everyday in the capital. On average, a family in Dhaka discards four polybags a day. Only ten per cent of them are kept at designated spots. Inadequate facilities are also responsible for the menace.

Typically, the bags are discarded on the streets or onto drains. Since polythene does not decompose as paper, polybags clog drains and sewers, resulting in water-logging.

Moreover, the recycling of polybags creates harmful hydrogen cyanide gas, which contributes to respiratory problems.

Sources said the production of polythene bags is highly profitable and the investment for setting up of factories is all too low. Preliminary investment in a polybag factory is only about Tk 2 lakh. The production cost of each thin polybag is Tk 0.05 to Tk 0.07, while the manufacturer sells each bag to the wholesaler at Tk 0.30 to Tk 0.35.