Cortijada Los Gazquez - Vida en 1000m. Parque Natural Sierra Maria Los Velez. Andalucia.

the rest of us. The whole of the EU. Yes, Italy has banned the use of plastic bags. Read more here.

So day one, and here is another reason not to consume…

So here you have it. I don’t make resolutions. I don’t know why, possibly because I know I can’t keep them. But this one is different. This one is more of a challenge and in ways we might not consider.

Here at Los Gázquez we are making  a New Year’s resolution to not consume ’single use plastics! There, I’ve said it. It’s now in the public domain and I shall blog this as an item throughout next year to see how successful we have been.

It’s not that I don’t like plastics. On the contrary, I love the the material especially when imbued with two important qualities. Two qualities which are inseparable. Design + longevity.

I have a small collection of Bakelite radios which still work and they have a fantastic sound quality. I have a plastic crate, lime green, for R.Whites lemonade. It’s followed me and my workshop for twenty years now and is an essential tool there. I buy the children plastic toys made by Playmobile. Design + Longevity.

But let’s realign our priorities. All you folks out there who point the finger of blame at the brutal corporate giants like BP, messing up the environment, have essentially only got yourselves to blame. If you want to consume petrochemical products such as fuel and plastics you will drive up the demand and add further risk of environmental disaster.

So where does the majority of this plastic crap go? Landfill and the sea. Since 1950 one billion tons of plastic has been discarded by us. The majority is in packaging.

I remember buying tea from a chai wallah on a train in India in the days when it was sold in a little terracotta cup made on the track side of the rail lines. When finished you threw the cup out of the window and it returned to the earth. Now it comes in plastic cups and when you have finished you throw it out of the window and it blows away to somewhere where we don’t have to think about it.

So where do we start. I suggest the plastic bag. We are going to buy one of those shopping trolleys old ladies take to the market so they don’t have to carry stuff and rather than buy our fruit and veg in a plastic bag we will tip them all into the trolley.

What else? Cling film and cellophane. Polystyrene trays. Plastic bottles, party cups…………