Reduce the plastic bags used at monday's market
Anonymous submitted on
Wednesday 27th November 2019
Complete
The market on redbrick every monday is great, however when passing, all I see is students with their fruit and veg in small plastic bags then in a larger plastic carrier bag. This amount of packaging is excessive and defeats the point of having a market with mostly loose products. A solution would be to enforce paper bags for the loose items and to have a bag charge at checkout similarly to supermarkets as an incentive to bring your own, donating the revenue to environmental causes.
Responses
Here, you can view the complete set of official responses from the sabbatical officers regarding this submission.
Students' Union replied on
Wednesday 18th Dec 2019 10:10am
Hi there,
I come back to you with an update! The market stallholders have responded with the following:
'We have been researching all aspects of the plastic we use for sometime now although some of the supplies we buy from use plastic and this is out of our control. We have got some great ideas for 2020 but this has been a long process, making sure we are
using the right materials. We do provide brown paper bags every week and we do charge 5p at the checkout similarly to supermarkets and now use half as many bags as we did last year. We also sell charity canvas bags where all the proceeds go to our local homeless charity, these are due to be restocked in the early part of 2020 as they where so popular they where a sell out very quickly. We also use punnets for our tomatoes which we reuse every week, and other fruits and vegetables when we can. Our plan is to make our company as plastic free as we can be and continue to research our options regularly.'
If you have any further questions, please feel free to get in touch with me via president@soton.ac.uk
Kind regards,
Emily Harrison,
SUSU President, 2019-20
Students' Union replied on
Tuesday 17th Dec 2019 11:15am
Hi there,
Thank you for your You Make Change submission.
I have flagged this to our Director of Union Services to discuss with the external traders who come to the market to find a solution that is as sustainable and achievable for them as possible. I will come back to you with an update as soon as I have one!
Kind regards,
Emily Harrison,
SUSU President, 2019-20
Actions
Forwarded to Union President
Tuesday 17th Dec 2019 12:12pm
Forwarded to Union President
Friday 29th Nov 2019 1:16pm
Comments
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Completely agree! I had the same idea funnily enough... there are cardboard boxes people can use too! No need for plastic bags!
I completely agree, sometimes the amount of packaging used in the market is ridiculous -- individually plastic-wrapped aubergines for example. I think all, or at least most, fruit and veg should be sold loose, as this also helps to reduce food waste for students who are cooking single portions and don't need a whole bag of something.
