By Isabella Senno
In order to align with Iowa City’s sustainability initiatives, Farmers’ Market vendors will no longer offer single-use plastic bags. Patrons are encouraged to bring in their own reusable containers.Juli Seydell Johnson, the director of Iowa City Parks and Recreation, said the decision was meant to be a step toward reducing the city’s environmental footprint in a smaller way than entirely banning plastic bags.
“We aren’t able to do it to that extent, but we are able to manage it as a sustainability effort at our Farmers’ Market, so we’ve decided to go ahead, and start it, and do it at that level,” Seydell Johnson said. “We get several hundred people through the market every Saturday morning; seeing that they will all be using now reusable bags, it’s a significant number that won’t be going to the landfill.”
Based on a 2011 waste-characterization study done in Iowa, plastic retail currently makes up 0.03 percent of what goes to landfills, around 35 to 36 tons of waste, said Jennifer Jordan, the city recycling coordinator.
“It sounds like a pretty small number, and it is, but if you think about the fact that most of the environmental damage is already done by the time bags are made … and get to us, so really significantly reducing their use is even more important than recycling them,” she said.
Even though plastic bags seem like a small item, Jordan said, they can have a lasting impact on the environment because of the method of production and relatively short use.
“Plastic bags are generally made from natural gas or another petroleum-based product, so … that natural resource has to be extracted and processed, and then the bags have to be transported, and there’s labor involved all along the way,” she said. “The average lifespan of a plastic bag is maybe 10 or 15 minutes by the time it gets from the grocery store to someone’s home, so we’re using a lot of natural resources just for a single use, very short lifespan of one bag.”
For the first few markets, 1,500 free cloth bags will be distributed; after supplies run out, bags will be sold for $3 apiece.
Seydell Johnson said the Farmers’ Market was chosen because its consumer demographic overlapped with those who were already making efforts to live more sustainably.
“People coming to the market are already supporting the local food economy … [it just seemed] to make sense to pair this next step with using reusable containers and bags along with that,” Seydell Johnson said. “We made the announcement last week on our Facebook page, and it has [had an] overwhelming positive response from the community.”
The initiative comes in the wake of HF 295 being signed into law in late March, which prevents cities from enacting plastic-bag bans. Jordan said Iowa City was considering a ban before the law was passed.
“If anything, we as a state should ban plastic bags, not stopping cities from doing it,” said Ann Christenson, a co-founder of local environmental advocacy group 100Grannies.org. “It’s absolutely essential that we stop pouring these plastics into our waterways, and I really, really applaud the Farmers’ Market for not using plastic bags anymore.”
