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Published on October 1, 2007

This month, Bangkok's shopping elite took a small step towards combating global warming, starting, appropriately, in some of the capital's most luxurious, air-conditioned department stores.

      The Mall Group recently launched an eco-friendly campaign at its eight department stores by switching from plastic to biodegradable bags.

From now on shoppers at the Mall's Gourmet Market outlets and swish department stores will be given the option of using a free biodegradable plastic bag or a reasonably priced canvas tote to carry their goodies back to their parked BMWs and Mercedes Benzes.

But while customers appreciate the green gesture, not everyone is happy with the design.

"What are those canvas bags meant for?" exclaims Sujima Viravaidya. "They are too small to carry the shopping for my family of four."

Sujima has been carrying around canvas or cloth bags since attending college in Australia a decade ago - mainly, she admits, because she thought it was cool to be different. She only became aware of the environmental issues when a canvas bag being sold by a local grocer sported a message on how it was helping to save the planet.

She'll be relieved to learn that the totes are available in different sizes and are either given away at the Gourmet Market with a purchase of more than Bt500 or can be purchased for between Bt70 to Bt399 depending on size.

The biodegradable plastic bags, made from a mixture of organic and plastic and guaranteed to disintegrate one and a half years after you've taken your purchases home, are The Mall's small contribution to fighting global warming.

The group, which operates the Emporium and Siam Paragon along with six other malls, now uses an estimated 150 million plastic bags a year.

"The biodegradable bags cost 5 to 10 per cent more than regular plastic bags," says Chamnarn Maythaprachakul, The Mall's senior vice-president for marketing. "We'll absorb that."

Stylist and writer Ploy Chariyaves is pleased that there's still an option between canvas and plastic. Ploy, who says she's doesn't refuse all plastic bags in the supermarket, although she won't accept unnecessary bagging, points out, "I do reuse those bags for my trash."

The Mall Group expects to spend Bt100 million on its bag campaign, which hopefully will become fashionable among Bangkok's plethora of competing department stores and supermarkets.

As well as helping to slow global warming the campaign should also protect eco-conscious customers against being hassled by security.

"I'm always been asked to show my receipt," says Sujima, who is constantly stopped by guards for not clutching a plastic bag, the only sign that the client has paid at the cashier counter.

The Bangkok Metropolitan Authority (BMA) has launched a similar campaign, handing out 30,000 canvas totes to the shopping public to encourage them to say no to plastic.

The BMA bags, bearing the logo "Let's Make Bangkok Cool", are part of Bangkok Governor Apirak Kosayothin's ambitious programme to reduce the capital's carbon emissions.

Bangkok is a good place to start for Thailand. The metropolis accounts for more than 40 per cent of the country's CO2 emissions, and each Bangkokian leaves a carbon footprint of 7.3 tonnes of CO2 per year, comparable to a citizen in London.

Apirak hopes to reduce the Bangkokian carbon footprint by one tonne by the year 2012, through a variety of campaigns including getting motorists to switch to bio-fuels, promoting energy-efficiency and growing more trees (there are only four square metres of green space per person in the city, home to about 10 million people).

However, some urban folk appear to be following trends rather than taking notice of environmental issues. They tend to use the canvas totes, many of which bear Anya Hindmarch's logo "I'm not a plastic bag," as a fashion accessory.

Ecologists are already worried that the canvas bag is just a fad that will quickly disappear. There's also some concern that the brightly coloured message painted on the tote's surface may contain harmful pollutants.

Ploy disagrees and insists that people are learning awareness from the message on the bags.

Vipasai Niyamabha, a Nation correspondent who's spent the past three months in London, says the totes are not a passing fad in the English capital. She adds that Londoners and Parisians only carry canvas and cloth bags when they go shopping. "They don't feel a need to carry them everywhere."

"A bag is a bag. You don't need one that says 'I'm not a plastic bag'," says Sujima.

On a recent visit to London Ploy was amused to spot totes announcing "I'm a canvas bag". She wonders if these will spark a trend here.

While it is generally accepted among serious global warming campaigners that the shopping bag strategy is a minor step, it is at least a step in the right direction, especially for the city's elite.

"The lifestyles of Bangkok's high society and upper middle classes have to change, and the way they change can have an influence on the other sectors of society," says Tara Buakamsri, a climate and energy campaigner for Greenpeace Thailand.

"So the plastic bag campaign is a good start. We are moving towards the more difficult issues, such as reducing energy use in buildings and homes and cutting back on city travel. Those will require more self sacrifice."

Ploy still finds the plastic bag practical in her everyday life and suggests there's no need to be too extreme and reject plastic outright.

"Just don't overuse it," she says.

Peter Janssen, Deutsche Presse-Agentur

 Sirinya Wattanasukchai, The Nation