Founded in 2005, the American Progressive Bag Alliance (APBA) is a group of American plastic bag manufacturers that represent a thriving and growing industry employing 30,800 American workers in 2010. APBA’s current areas of focus include:
- City proposals that could impact consumer use of plastic bags
- Increasing recycling opportunities
- Litter prevention
- Increasing bag reuse
- Correcting misperceptions concerning litter and waste
More information can be found at www.plasticbagrecycling.org and www.bagtheban.org.
Multi-use plastic bags are 100% recyclable and made from American natural gas.
In addition to recycling, a recent national survey shows that over 90% of Americans reuse their plastic bags.
- About 65% of Americans reuse their bags for trash disposal. Other common uses include lunch bags and pet pick-up.
- In this regard, the reuse of a plastic shopping bag prevents a second bag from being purchased to fulfill these necessary functions. These replacement bags are often thicker, bigger and intended to go to the landfill, meaning the unintended consequence is that more plastic is going into the landfill.
Communities across the country are supporting efforts to reduce, reuse and recycle plastic bags as the tried-and-true approach to responsible handling. These simple, common-sense steps can help reduce waste, prevent litter and keep our environment clean. And they're working!
More than 30,000 American manufacturing jobs in 349 plants across the country are threatened by proposed ordinances to ban and tax plastic bags.
The United States is the world leader in plastic bag and film recycling, providing many green technologies and jobs.
A typical plastic bag weighs 4-5 grams and can hold up to 17 pounds—nearly 2,000 times its own weight.
Plastic grocery bags require 70% less energy to manufacture than paper bags, and produce half the amount of greenhouse gas emissions in the process.
Plastic Bags take up 85 percent less space than paper bags in landfills.
MYTH
Plastic bag bans and taxes are spreading like wildfires across states and cities across the country
TRUTH
Only a handful of municipalities have enacted bans or taxes on plastic bags after we were able to provide information to legislators explaining that they don’t work to reduce bag litter, and that a better environmental policy is to promote a redeuce, reuse and recycle strategy.
