Taynuilt Turning the Tide: Making cloth bags a habit. Taynuilt Turning the Tide Project has been working together with Taynuilt Traders since January 2008 to facilitate Taynuilt to reduce its consumption of plastic carrier bags with the support and help of North Argyll Community Trust and Taynuilt Community Council.

Inspired by the plastic bag free village of Modbury, a Taynuilt resident decided to do something about the plastic bags littering our beautiful countryside and ending up in our oceans. Taynuilt is now joining other forward thinking communities in Scotland, the UK and the world tackling the problems of plastics in our environment.

Taynuilt Turning the Tide Project has been working together with Taynuilt Traders since January 2008 to facilitate Taynuilt to reduce its consumption of plastic carrier bags with the support and help of North Argyll Community Trust and Taynuilt Community Council.

To cut down on the amount of plastic bags going to landfill and finding their way into our rivers, streams, sea lochs and global oceans, Taynuilt Traders: Grahams Stores, Grants the Butchers, Taynuilt Post Office, Tracey's Hair Salon, The Taynuilt Hotel, Taynuilt Medical Practice, Corachie Clematis Plant Centre Ltd and Lorne Sim Garage Services are endeavouring to work towards reducing the number of plastic bags entering into our environment. If other traders wish to join the project please leave a message on the Taynuilt Forum.

Community Recycling Network Scotland provided funding for the project so that each household within the Taynuilt Community Council catchment area (approx 525 households) would receive two Taynuilt Turning the Tide Sustainable Fairtrade Cloth/Canvas bags. This was achieved the week before the official launch of the project on 13th December 2008.

A FEW PLASTIC FACTS, it is estimated that:

A plastic bag takes 450 -1,000 years to degrade.

Each cloth bag in its lifetime will save its owner using approximately 1,000 plastic bags. This means that for this Project alone we will be potentially saving 1,500,000 plastic bags from ultimately going to landfill or into our environment.

This 1,500,000 plastic bag saving will also reduce CO2 emissions and our village's carbon footprint.

You might be tempted to use biodegradable/degradable plastic bags which some supermarkets use, however, on breaking down these still lead to toxins entering our food chain.

80% of marine litter comes from land by wind, washed down drains or swept down rivers and streams and end up in our seas and oceans.

Marine mammals often mistake plastic bags for jellyfish or squid.

100,000 marine mammals and 1,000,000 seabirds die as a result of plastics ingestion/entanglement in our oceans each year.

Seabirds confuse plastic items with their staple diet.

Earlier this year a cuvier whale was washed up dead on the coast of Mull containing 23 plastic bags in its stomach.

If you forget to take your cloth bags when shopping, Village Traders can provide an alternative 100% biodegradable compostable cornstarch carrier bag or recycled paper carrier for which there may be a small charge. For this purpose, we have been careful to research the best environmentally friendly alternatives available to date.

How Taynuilt Primary School got involved:
Just before the school's annual litter clear up at Easter, children from Taynuilt Primary School listened to a presentation given by the TTT project outlining the hazards of plastics in our environment. The children's drawings depicting their interpretation of plastic hazards have been used to illustrate the leaflet which was distributed to over 500 households in our rural area, along with the free cloth bags...

THANK YOU TO
TAYNUILT PRIMARY SCHOOL
for their annual litter clean up of the village!

Dog poo discarded in a
plastic bag - where's the logic??!!

A small minority of dog owners discard plastic bags full of dog poo into our beautiful countryside and rivers. Please dispose of your dog poo responsibly using cornstarch bags and the public litter bins.

If you are concerned about how plastics are poisoning our oceans and environment please check out these informative links:

Plastic Bag Free Modbury

Message in the Waves - essential viewing YouTube video

Ocean of Plastic -YouTube videos showing the horrific consequences of our use of plastic

The Marine Conservation Society

Algalita Marine research Foundation

"Plastic Soup" is this where plastic bags from Taynuilt end up?

Poisoning our Global Oceans - there are more plastic particles in our oceans than plankton! - plastic particles chemically attract toxins such as DDT which then enter our food chain.

An area of our oceans twice the size of Texas poisoned by "plastic soup".

Want to learn more about compostable cornstarch bags from a Scottish supplier?

Gannet strangled by plastic bag

These Carrier bags are Certified Compostable and Biodegradable according to several international standards, including European Standard EN 13432.

This is probably the only environmentally acceptable carrier bag.

Plastic bags in outer space?

Yes, its true! The first plastic bag has been spotted in outer space!
Plastic Bag spotted in space

If you wish to discuss any issue about Taynuilt and the surrounding area, its resources, other projects you would like to develop and get started, even if you just have something for sale - head over to the Taynuilt Forum, sign up and join in (this forum is only open to people who live in Taynuilt Community Council catchment area. You will have to give your name, address and valid email address to become part of the forum).