PM asks Thais to stop using plastic bags every 15th day of the month

[metisdead]

Off topic generalization posts and replies have been removed as well as some troll posts.

[manfredtillmann]

these things don't change over night, in northern europe it took years to change the mind set of people, in australia it has only just started and is far from accomplished. and it will take an even longer time here.

particularly the food markets will not be able to exist without plastic. how would you buy som tam, gai jung or pra mutt unless you bring your own tupper ware container?

when we go shopping we try to 'lead by example', taking our own baskets and bags. still attracts plenty of smiles and questioning looks when we take the pineapples from the scales and put them 'as is' into our market basket. even at lotus it's a constant battle to prevent the checkout staff from packing plastic wraped stuff into another plastic bag instead of our shopping bags held open and ready for them.

i am confident change will happen, but perhaps not in my life time?

[impulse]

Dear pm - please stop with this foolishness. How's fighting corruption going? From my knowledge the police force and land departments are as corrupt as ever. What are you going about this ? Plastic bags. Grow up.

So you don't figure that quality of life would improve, along with tourist spending if the place presented a little cleaner?

The fact that governments around the entire world have dealt with the issue of paper vs plastic vs cloth bags indicates that it is a serious topic, and hardly "foolishness".

I think CiaranO's gripe is less about plastic bags than Prayudh's feeling the need to bestow his wisdom on every topic under the sun. Less can be more and all that..

The same "less is more" can be said about the posters who seem to think every topic is an opportunity to slam the General (or Thaksin, or Yingluk, or Obama).

[Lite Beer]

Bring your own cloth bags when go shopping today

BANGKOK: -- Don't forget to bring along your cloth bags when go shopping at all 15 major companies that operate department stores, super makets, super centres, and convenient stores as they will not use plastic bags to keep your purchases today as they began for the first time to observe the "plastic bags-free" campaign.

The stores joining the campaign compruse B2S, CP All, Big C, The Mall Group, Food Land, Siam Makro, Robinson, Central, Central Food Retail, Central Marketing Group, Rangsit Plaza, CRC Thaiwasadu, CRC Sports, Power Buy, and Ekkachai Distribution System.

The campaign was aimed at reducing the use of plastic waste.

The Department of Environmental Promotion expects to reduce over a million plastic bags a day under the campaign which will be held on the 15th of every month.

Prime Minister Gen Prayut Chan-o-cha also urged the people to cooperate in the campaign during his address on his weekly “Returning Happinesss to the Thai People” programme last night.

The prime minister said that the amount of plastic garbage would be 70 million plastic bags less per day if every Thai stops using just one plastic bag a day.

The current government places great importance in sustainable development and is environment friendly and, therefore, has designated garbage disposal as a national agenda under 3R principle which is reduce, reuse and recycle, said the prime minister.

Beginning this Saturday, the government in cooperation with the private sector which include operators of department stores, malls and convenience stores will urge members of the public to bring their own bags to carry the goods they bought instead of asking plastic bags, said the prime minister.

He further said that it would be much better if the people could stop using plastic bags more than one day within a month or every day.

Source: http://englishnews.thaipbs.or.th/bring-your-own-cloth-bags-when-go-shopping-today

-- Thai PBS 2015-08-15

[BuddhistVirus]

I buy a can of San Miguel at the local minimart and they give me a little plastic bag and a plastic straw. Brainless.

Hope you refused...if not, you may need to change your view on brainless.

[balo]

How about PM asks Thais to pick up trash from the roads every week ? It looks really disgusting in some areas.

[lildragon]

It still makes me burst out laughing every time I hear the name of his ridiculous brain washing show

[SoilSpoil]

Suggestions are good but offer the alternitives as well. What exactly is suggestion to do if plastic bags are not used? This is a place to educate the public and offer suggestions. How can the public shop without plastic? Recycle bags is 1 way and??

Pardon? Have a good look when you check out at BigC or Makro. Plenty if nice bags around

IKEA sells those big blue super strong bags for 20 baht each. I have 4 of them and they're just great for shopping.

[CiaranO]

Dear pm - please stop with this foolishness. How's fighting corruption going? From my knowledge the police force and land departments are as corrupt as ever. What are you going about this ? Plastic bags. Grow up.

So you don't figure that quality of life would improve, along with tourist spending if the place presented a little cleaner?

The fact that governments around the entire world have dealt with the issue of paper vs plastic vs cloth bags indicates that it is a serious topic, and hardly "foolishness".

I am going to go out on a limb here and say it would make absolutely zero difference in litter and the presentation of any tourist area. None.

Tourist spending is down to many things but not plastic bags.

[jaywalker]

How about PM asks Thais to pick up trash from the roads every week ? It looks really disgusting in some areas.

How about putting some chain-gangs to work?

From what I read, Thai prisons are slap full to the brim. Put a gazillion of them out out there picking up trash.

Nah. They's probably get drugs & who knows what smuggled to them that way via corrupt prison guards.

----------------------------------

I had an older brother, (God rest his soul) that did 6 months once in the clink (USA). He'd get his buddy to toss a full pack of cigarettes on the side of the road the day before his crew was due in there to cut the grass.

[canuckamuck]

Some simple public awareness campaigns tied to the concept of national face would go a long way to reduce litter and wasteful packaging.

Top celebs in ads during primetime would be a great start.

Going cold turkey on bags every 30 days will just teach people to work around another poorly thought out inconvenient policy.

Edited August 15, 2015 by canuckamuck

[Thian]

If you walk around in Thonglor with a backpack the police will harass you like you are a drugdealer.

So i stopped using backpacks.

[impulse]

Dear pm - please stop with this foolishness. How's fighting corruption going? From my knowledge the police force and land departments are as corrupt as ever. What are you going about this ? Plastic bags. Grow up.

So you don't figure that quality of life would improve, along with tourist spending if the place presented a little cleaner?

The fact that governments around the entire world have dealt with the issue of paper vs plastic vs cloth bags indicates that it is a serious topic, and hardly "foolishness".

I am going to go out on a limb here and say it would make absolutely zero difference in litter and the presentation of any tourist area. None.

Tourist spending is down to many things but not plastic bags.

In the immmediate term, I'd agree with you. Tourism is up and down on other factors.

But in the long term, it's a huge factor. I can guaranty you people who came to Thailand and found the beaches and parks piled up with plastic bags and other trash, have made other plans for future holidays. I've met a bunch of them. They go to the Virgin Islands, the Caymans, Belize, even Florida, and any one of a thousand alternatives.

People expecting a tropical paradise, (and paying as if they're going to one) will move on with their sweaty tourist money if they find a garbage dump where the beach should have been.

The good news is that the effect is self limiting. For every non-visitor, another tourist takes their place- up the the handling capacity. But the ones that take their place are the ones who choose where to go based on their limited budget. And you have to entice them with "cheap", rather than with "good". So the tourist spending diminishes even if the tourist numbers don't.

And that's not to mention the quality of life for millions of locals who have to live in the filth day in and day out.

Edited August 15, 2015 by impulse

[jaywalker]

How about PM asks Thais to pick up trash from the roads every week ? It looks really disgusting in some areas.

HEAVEN FORBID that you drop a ciggie butt on the sidewalk in BKK though!

I got dinged 300 baht for that one once.

------------------------------

I drove down Pratamnak Soi 4 in Pattaya/Jomtien one evening to the beach. A Thai family was there, Mom, Dad & two kids. They BLATANTLY left coke bottles & all manner of trash/plastic bags on the beach right in front of me when they left.

There was a BIB sitting not 10 feet away from me. We were both sitting on the concrete steps.

I sat there for 20 minutes, and couldn't stand it. I went down and collected their trash and put it in a garbage can/bin.

The BOY in Brown just grinned at me.

[Brit_Doggie]

I'm all for wearing a paper condom on the 15th of every month, but please don't tell the wife.

[rijb]

How much rice can cargo pants hold?

[manfredtillmann]

How about PM asks Thais to pick up trash from the roads every week ? It looks really disgusting in some areas.

HEAVEN FORBID that you drop a ciggie butt on the sidewalk in BKK though!

I got dinged 300 baht for that one once.

------------------------------

I drove down Pratamnak Soi 4 in Pattaya/Jomtien one evening to the beach. A Thai family was there, Mom, Dad & two kids. They BLATANTLY left coke bottles & all manner of trash/plastic bags on the beach right in front of me when they left.

There was a BIB sitting not 10 feet away from me. We were both sitting on the concrete steps.

I sat there for 20 minutes, and couldn't stand it. I went down and collected their trash and put it in a garbage can/bin.

The BOY in Brown just grinned at me.

yep! there is a family sitting in front of my place on the banks of the river, just pulled up for lunch. styrofoam food containers, plastc drink bottles, plenty of bags. one of those 'soup pot' old tyre rubbish bins is only about 25m away. but i know where there left overs are going when they are done - straight over the wall onto the banks of the mekong, to joint the tons of other junk that has not been washed away last week...

[impulse]

How much rice can cargo pants hold?

Wasn't a recent TVF poster circulating a petition to try to outlaw cargo pants? I was looking for a copy to sign...

[tbthailand]

wow, no plastic one day a month.

while he's at it, why not ask Thais to not then burn their plastic bags every morning of the month...

[jaywalker]

Dear pm - please stop with this foolishness. How's fighting corruption going? From my knowledge the police force and land departments are as corrupt as ever. What are you going about this ? Plastic bags. Grow up.

So you don't figure that quality of life would improve, along with tourist spending if the place presented a little cleaner?

The fact that governments around the entire world have dealt with the issue of paper vs plastic vs cloth bags indicates that it is a serious topic, and hardly "foolishness".

I am going to go out on a limb here and say it would make absolutely zero difference in litter and the presentation of any tourist area. None.

Tourist spending is down to many things but not plastic bags.

In the immmediate term, I'd agree with you. Tourism is up and down on other factors.

But in the long term, it's a huge factor. I can guaranty you people who came to Thailand and found the beaches and parks piled up with plastic bags and other trash, have made other plans for future holidays. I've met a bunch of them. They go to the Virgin Islands, the Caymans, Belize, even Florida, and any one of a thousand alternatives.

People expecting a tropical paradise, (and paying as if they're going to one) will move on with their sweaty tourist money if they find a garbage dump where the beach should have been.

The good news is that the effect is self limiting. For every non-visitor, another tourist takes their place- up the the handling capacity. But the ones that take their place are the ones who choose where to go based on their limited budget. And you have to entice them with "cheap", rather than with "good". So the tourist spending diminishes even if the tourist numbers don't.

And that's not to mention the quality of life for millions of locals who have to live in the filth day in and day out.

Well said indeed.

I and my family are from Florida.

My brother & his rather, ummm, errr, farang, Bible-thumping & opinionated wife of 30+ years were talking about a visit to Thailand.

I had to say (to him)

"No, no, no. She'll HATE it here Man! The beaches are dirty, there's a scam on every corner, they drive on the wrong side of the road, etc, etc, etc!!!!!!!

Your wife already hates me. PLEASE DO NOT bring her to Thailand! Go to Jamaica or the Cayman Islands or something!".

My brother, as hen-pecked as he is, saw the logic in that.

My sister-in-law would probably enjoy rural Issan, but I was living in Pattaya at the time.

Then again, the last time I was in Surin, there was funeral next door. 20 foot tall loudspeakers 20 feet away 20 hours a day for 5 days straight.

Noise pollution in Thailand is as rampant as plastic bag pollution.

[SABloke]

http://countrymeters.info/en/Thailand

68 million thais where does the 70 million come from////??

Perhaps one or two of them go shopping twice a day?

And...are babies using plastic bags???

[phoenixdoglover]

I've got no problem with a national effort to reduce the use of non-biodegradable plastics.

But, I do have a problem when the PM makes a small plastic bag initiative a focus of his address, and ignores the huge environmental problems of the country.

A few observations that can be made by anyone who visits Thailand:

1) The canals are heavily polluted with human waste

2) The roadsides have piles of construction waste and domestic trash leaching into the waterways

3) At some times and places, the air is so thick with smoke it is hazardous to breathing

While we're all wringing our hands about the use of plastic bags and too much beach litter, which should be reduced, the major environmental problems of Thailand are undoubtedly causing chronic health problems and premature deaths.

Outside economists have criticized the current Thai government for inadequate public spending. The government itself has admitted it has under-spent the project budget. The government has announced they want to go forward with thousands of projects to employ people and move the country forward. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see the great need for environmental cleanup...and the opportunity to employ people.

One day a month...No Plastic Bags!

Gimme a break.

[jaywalker]

Some simple public awareness campaigns tied to the concept of national face would go a long way to reduce litter and wasteful packaging.

Top celebs in ads during primetime would be a great start.

Going cold turkey on bags every 30 days will just teach people to work around another poorly thought out inconvenient policy.

I could not agree more. We all know how crazy the Thai's are about their celebrity personalities.

If they made it "Uncool" to litter, on TV (television) it might help. The current powers that be should encourage them, but, then again, they are terrified of the media.

[impulse]

My brother & his rather, ummm, errr, farang, Bible-thumping & opinionated wife of 30+ years were talking about a visit to Thailand.

I had to say (to him)

"No, no, no. She'll HATE it here Man! The beaches are dirty, there's a scam on every corner, they drive on the wrong side of the road, etc, etc, etc!!!!!!!

Your wife already hates me. PLEASE DO NOT bring her to Thailand! Go to Jamaica or the Cayman Islands or something!".

I've also been discouraging my friends and family from visiting me in Thailand from Texas. Not that they'd hate it, but there are places within a 2 hour flight that are just as nice, and not much more expensive. And a 2 hour flight isn't a tragedy if the destination is a disappointment. 24-40 hours of travel each way is just too far to risk stepping out of your beachfront hotel into a mass of plastic trash where there used to be a beach, and getting a rash from even wading into the polluted water.

[impulse]

I've got no problem with a national effort to reduce the use of non-biodegradable plastics.

....

It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see the great need for environmental cleanup...and the opportunity to employ people.

One day a month...No Plastic Bags!

Gimme a break.

So where would you start? Today.

I salute the guy for a start. Trying somehting new. Certainly not a definitive solution, but not irreversible, either. If it works, then he can take the next step. If it's a flop, nobody's been hurt.

Seems reasonable.

[jaywalker]

My brother & his rather, ummm, errr, farang, Bible-thumping & opinionated wife of 30+ years were talking about a visit to Thailand.

I had to say (to him)

"No, no, no. She'll HATE it here Man! The beaches are dirty, there's a scam on every corner, they drive on the wrong side of the road, etc, etc, etc!!!!!!!

Your wife already hates me. PLEASE DO NOT bring her to Thailand! Go to Jamaica or the Cayman Islands or something!".

I've also been discouraging my friends and family from visiting me in Thailand from Texas. Not that they'd hate it, but there are places within a 2 hour flight that are just as nice, and not much more expensive. And a 2 hour flight isn't a tragedy if the destination is a disappointment. 24-40 hours of travel each way is just too far to risk stepping out of your beachfront hotel into a mass of plastic trash where there used to be a beach, and getting a rash from even wading into the polluted water.

My very close Floridian friend married a hah-sip/hahsip Thai/Farang woman in Florida.

She had only ever visited Thailand once when she was about 7 years old.....and visited Pattaya at that. She didn't even know how to say "Sawatdee Ka" when they got married. She was/is 1,000% Amercanized.

I can yammer away at her mother in Thai (in Florida) and she doesn't understand a word of it. Her mother is a COMPLETE PSYCHO too.

Told me she just remembered being at a beach where the tide went way out sometimes when she was kid.

I talked them into coming over to visit me in Pattaya for their honeymoon & took them down Walking Street.

She started calling me "Home-Wrecker" after that, as she was rather fat & couldn't hold a candle to the local talent.

She scarfed her husband up out of there as fast as she could go!

Edited August 15, 2015 by jaywalker

[JAG]

How much rice can cargo pants hold?

Digested and metamorphised ( if that is the correct biological expression) or in the pockets? Edited August 15, 2015 by JAG

[phoenixdoglover]

I've got no problem with a national effort to reduce the use of non-biodegradable plastics.

....

It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see the great need for environmental cleanup...and the opportunity to employ people.

One day a month...No Plastic Bags!

Gimme a break.

So where would you start? Today.

I salute the guy for a start. Trying somehting new. Certainly not a definitive solution, but not irreversible, either. If it works, then he can take the next step. If it's a flop, nobody's been hurt.

Seems reasonable.

In my view, his proposal is too timid.

Here is what I would do regarding the 3 problems I identified.

1) Canal Pollution

- a new policy to establish greenways along polluted canals

- a program for relocation assistance for the squatters and others who are living on canal banks

- a new urban drainage management program, probably 20 year time frame, to capture a redirect urban runoff

- additional funding for sewers and treatment, focused on reducing untreated discharges to canals

2) Large Scale Roadside Trash

- a zero tolerance policy for roadside trash

- investment in signage to discourage littering and communicate penalties, steep fines for bulk littering

- a public works employment program for rural roadside cleanup, additional vehicles

- investment in state of art landfills

3) Air Pollution from Agricultural Burning

- new regulations prohibiting unregulated agricultural burning exceeding a certain area

- new service for monitoring meteorological conditions and announcing No Burn days when conditions are unfavorable

- a permit system for large scale burning

- gradual phasing out of agricultural burning practices, say over the course of 10 years

Finally, to support all of these initiatives, establishment or strengthening of environmental law enforcement. This initiative would be part of decentralization and reorganization of the RTP, which in my view is one of two major reforms needed in Thailand. The other reform is the constitutional role and reporting accountability of the military.

[Basil B]

What next...

Do not use condoms on the 16th of the month???

[Artisi]

Suggestions are good but offer the alternitives as well. What exactly is suggestion to do if plastic bags are not used? This is a place to educate the public and offer suggestions. How can the public shop without plastic? Recycle bags is 1 way and??

Pardon? Have a good look when you check out at BigC or Makro. Plenty if nice bags around

IKEA sells those big blue super strong bags for 20 baht each. I have 4 of them and they're just great for shopping.

Same same, I have bought a number of the large shopping bags from here and as well as from Aust. great for shopping and saves on the dozens of plastic bags I used to collect every week.

The policy of reducing plastic bags (as in used at the checkout) should be phased in a month or so till the point of NO plastic bags used at the checkout.

I know - whinge whinge whinge - but let them whinge and cry about it - just do it.

Edited August 15, 2015 by Artisi