Berkeley Farmers' Markets First to Ban Plastics

 
Come 2009, plastics will be pulled from all three Berkeley Farmers' Markets. The ban includes plastic bags, packaging for prepared foods, utensils, and to-go ware, says Ecology Center Market Manager Ben Feldman. "The overall goal is zero waste," says Feldman. "This initial step is really a step in eventually preventing us from putting anything in the landfill." Vendors will be asked to phase out plastic in favor of compostable bio-bags.
 
The Berkeley Farmers' Markets received a grant from Alameda County Waste Management (StopWaste.org) that will allow the purchase of over 120,000 compostable bags to sell to vendors. The markets will subsidize the cost of the bags to provide an incentive and to ease the transition to the compostable bags, which run about fourteen cents per bag compared to two cents for plastic bags. The subsidized compostable bags will be priced to what the farmers pay now for plastics.

Vendors selling prepared foods will be required to use compostable packaging and utensils or reusable containers that can be returned with a deposit. Feldman notes that many vendors and farmers have already begun using compostable packaging and bags, and that the overall reaction to the ban has been very positive.
 
In conjunction, Ecology Center staffers will launch a customer education campaign about zero waste. Feldman notes, for instance, that customers can get multiple uses out of the compostable bags, using them to reline kitchen scrap buckets or small compost bins at home.

And of course, Feldman wants to encourage market customers to bring their own reusable bags. "While we consider the compostable bags to be better than plastic, they still require natural resources and energy to produce. They're considered renewable resources, but they're ultimately not the way to go."
 
Feldman has a vision in mind: "Ideally, if we could move up the chain and not be producing the bio-bag material at all, and the compostable stuff stays on the farm, and our prepared food vendors are using reusable plates, we won't be putting anything in the landfill," says Feldman. "Once we get that far I'll consider us a zero waste zone."

The Berkeley Markets are the first in the Bay Area to ban plastics. The decision comes on the heels of November 2007 legislation to remove plastic shopping bags at grocery stores in San Francisco. Stores distribute over 180 million plastic bags each year, and these bags eventually find their way into landfills, waterways, and the ocean.
 
-Mary Vance