Hi! My name is Ruby, I’m a volunteer with the Ban the Bag team at Greenpeace Australia Pacific. Welcome to the campaign and to the Greenpeace family!

​Plastic Bag in the Waters of Laganas Bay in Greece|Sea Turtle around Fitzroy Island and Green Island
​Plastic bag in the waters of Laganas Bay, the most important nesting area for loggerhead sea turtles in the Mediterranean Sea. Plastic bags can block the digestive system and cause death to loggerhead sea turtles who mistake them for jellyfish. ​Each year approximately 4,3 billion plastic bags are used in Greece.|The Great Barrier Reef is experiencing its worst bleaching event to date with studies showing 93 percent of the reef being effected. Bleaching is caused by the warmer temperature of the waters brought about by the El Nino system. This current event gives a window into the impacts of climate change. Additionally parts of the reef have been damaged by cyclones, the severity and frequency of which will also increase with global temperature rise. The Australian Federal Government and the Queensland State Government this year granted approvals for the Carmichael Coal Mine, the largest ever in Australia, which will export coal through the Great Barrier Reef. The emissions from the burned coal directly contributes to the destruction of the Great Barrier Reef.

While the severest bleaching occurred in the northern parts of the reef, this documentation was captured in the mid section, at Green Island and Fitzroy Island, both just off the coast of Cairns.

 

Sea Turtle around Fitzroy Island near the Great Barrier Reef

 

In case you’ve stumbled upon this page and have no idea what this campaign or blog is about, here’s a quick introduction.

Every year, over fifty million of these single-use plastic bags end up in our environment, this has devastating effects on marine life, water systems and landscapes.

This fact is pretty crazy – especially when you learn the average plastic bag is used for just 12 minutes but can last for around 1000+ years. Worse still, over time plastic bags break up into smaller plastic pieces, so they never really leave us. This means that every single plastic item that you have ever used still exists today.

We have to act now to clean up our oceans. South Australia, Tasmania, the Northern Territory and ACT already have successful plastic bag bans in place. It’s time for the four biggest States – Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria and Western Australia – to step up and take plastic bags off the menu for marine life.

 What does this mean for you?

Greenpeace is nothing without our unbelievable supporters. Because of this, we’re handing the campaign over to you! Whether you live in a major city or in regional Australia, we need you. It’s only with your amazing support that we’ll be able to reach as many people as possible. If you’re passionate about plastic pollution, waste in general or the environment as a whole, join us and become an ambassador for the Bag the Bag campaign in your local area!

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This page will give you the tools you need to be a Ban the Bag ambassador. But what’s really exciting about the campaign is that it’s up to you! Be as creative as you want, share the petition on social media, go to a local fair with a paper petition or even host a plastic free dinner party!  

If there is anything that you feel is missing, please feel free to contact me at [email protected].

Click here for the Ambassador toolkit for a background on the campaign as well as ideas for activities. You can take a quick peak through it below…

What else have we got to give you?

We have created a bunch of different materials that you can use to help with your campaign.

A great way to help ban the bag is to contact your local MP. Click here to find a sample letter that you can copy and send or use as a template to write your own!

“But what do I say to people when they ask me about the campaign?!” If you’re not quite sure how to answer, we have your back! Click here for a list of potential questions people might ask you, and then some example responses.

If you’re at a school fair or our local supermarket, why not have people sign the petition? Find attached the printable petition forms for:

Victoria

Queensland

New South Wales

Western Australia

Do you have a passion for design? Or an idea for an amazing poster? For the creatives with design skills – we also have a ‘ban the bag logo’ to use on any of your flyers, posters, t-shirts and badges. We have three different types one, two and three.

I also want to invite you to join our online ban the bag community on Greenwire. This will be the place where we can share all our stories and connect with other ambassadors in your state. Make yourself a profile and join the team. Once you’ve created a profile for yourself and joined the national ban the bag group – write a message in the ‘shoutbox’ to say hello! We also have state based pages where you can post up local events. There is one for VIC, NSW, QLD and WA.

While you’re out and about getting people to sign onto the petition, why not hand out a few flyers as well! We have two flyers here and here that you can download, print and hand out, like the one below.

Want to listen to the call?

If you’re looking for more information we also recorded our call from Wednesday 13 July. Below you can watch and listen to Samantha talk about the campaign in more detail. At about 30 minutes in you can listen to some of the ambassadors discuss ideas about how they are going to take the campaign to their local community! Amazing stuff 🙂

 

That’s all for now. Thank you so much for being the driving force behind this campaign. Without people like you, the world would never change. Together we can Ban the Bag!

 

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