Photo: greenhem (flickr)

Plastic bags have long been associated with litter and waste. The world uses tens of billions of plastic bags every year – bags that end up hanging from trees, traveling along freeways, escaping garbage cans and waste dumps.

Plastic-bag recycling rates are extremely low – about 1 to 3 percent worldwide, according to Reusablebags.com.

While plastics have helped us in many ways – medical advances, for one – by now we are seeing an increasing amount of wasteful uses. The mass production and ubiquitousness of plastic bags has hit a nerve in many developing countries. Lawmaking bodies in every region of the world have begun to regulate the use of plastics — and some are even banning the use of plastic bags outright.

Here's a partial list:

India. In August 2005, the state of Maharashtra initiated a bag ban after bags "blocked sewage and drainage systems during record monsoon rains," according to The Guardian. "Flooding and landslides killed more than 1,000 people in the state.” Anyone seen with a plastic bag can be fined 1,000 rupees, or about $25.

Kenya. The East African nation has enforced new regulations banning production and distribution of light-density bags, according to Nairobi's Business Daily (as reported by allAfrica.com). Three years ago, Kenyan researchers had appealed for a ban, and Nobel Peace Prize winner Wangari Maathai had argued that plastic bags can lead to malaria, because discarded bags left outside can fill with rainwater and breed disease-carrying mosquitoes.

Uganda and Tanzania. Kenya's neighbors also banned the use of all disposable one-use plastic bags nationwide. One Ugandan blogger wrote that “This seemingly radical step has a direct connection to human health and also to environmental well-being of citizens across Africa. Apart from the fossil fuel usage needed in their production, plastic bags have a remarkable ability to pollute across borders.”

China. Authorities announced that by this June, one-use plastic bags will be outlawed in the hope that residents will return to their old habit of using cloth bags and baskets. "Beijing residents appeared to take the ban in stride, reflecting rising environmental consciousness and concern over skyrocketing oil prices," reports National Geographic.

Some developed nations also have taken drastic steps to reduce the impact of plastics. Ireland, for example, imposed a 33-cent tax in 2002. It worked quickly to depress demand. According to the New York Times, the use of plastic bags dropped 94 percent within weeks.

Photo: JohnMMM (Flickr)

Typically, the discovery of “black gold” in African countries has led to conflict over land and overwhelms governments with more revenue than can be effectively managed. Brutal secessionist conflicts have been taking place for years in countries rich with oil, including Sudan, Nigeria and Angola. Ghana hopes to buck the trend. The country is one of the most stable on the continent and responsible development of its oil industry can provide a good model for other African nations.

"There’s no reason that oil should be a curse,” one government official told Financial Times, which recently published a special report on Africa's fossil-fuel resources. “We want to make sure we follow the example of countries like Canada or Norway who’ve used oil to their benefit."

Why can’t African countries – or any developing country, for that matter – use newfound oil wealth to raise living standards for all citizens? For starters, the oil market is vulnerable to price shocks, and the centralized revenues are susceptible to theft. Dependency on oil as a primary commodity can discourage economic diversification.

Another critical issue is the exploitation of indigenous populations near extraction sites, a prime example being the abuses felt by those in the Niger delta region of Nigeria. Governments frequently overlook the fundamental needs of communities adjacent to oil drilling sites. Ghana’s new oil find may not be very beneficial to communities that fish the waters where the discovery was made.

Can Ghana avoid these pitfalls? The government says it plans to use the oil wealth to turn Ghana into "a middle-income country" by 2015, and to invest in infrastructure, health care and education. That's reminiscent of rhetoric used by officials in Nigeria, Angola, and the Congo — all are failing to follow through with those promises.

Can Ghana succeed in turning the “black gold” into a blessing for its citizens, or will oil once again prove a curse?

Tobacco Farm. Photo: norsenut (flickr)

One of the most ambitious attempts to control tobacco in the world is being ignored.
The World Health Organization’s tobacco control treaty entered into effect almost exactly three years ago today. It was an unprecedented move by global leaders to target the harmful public health outcome of increased tobacco use, notable especially in the developing world.

According to the World Health Organization, if current trends in the expansion of tobacco use worldwide continue, especially in the developing world where currently half of the deaths due to tobacco occur, “seven out of every ten deaths due to tobacco will occur in the developing world by 2020.”

Three years from the day the treaty went into effect, many countries have made no progress toward minimizing this potential public health disaster, according to the editorial board of the New York Times. "With tobacco use declining in wealthier countries, tobacco companies are spending tens of billions of dollars a year on advertising, marketing and sponsorship, much of it to increase sales in these developing countries." This inundation, as well as the tax revenue governments in developing countries can obtain from tobacco companies, have discouraged many of the countries most crucially affected by tobacco use from pushing any harder to promote the changes of this treaty.

Finally, there is an upbeat news piece about Africa. The BBC released a brief story on Jan. 31st about the opening of a stock market in Rwanda. For a country that has known its share of sorrow, this is one more element that can direct Rwanda toward a more hopeful future.

Upon opening the Rwanda Capital Market, President Paul Kagame described it as a milestone for the nation. The hope is that the exchange will aid the economy, which has yet to bounce back after the 1994 genocide.

Photo: Thatcher Cook for Mercy Corps

Can poor countries afford to be green?

A new report, the annually released Environmental Performance Index suggests that poor countries have been justified to disagree with blocs who demand environmental and other green protections even to the opposition of economic growth, according to the Economist. The connection between economic growth and the environment is not entirely clear, the study finds.

“Economic growth, coupled with good governance, may yet prove to be a source of solutions rather than problems. At the moment, perhaps 2 billion people have no formal access to modern energy—they make do with cow dung, agricultural residue and other solid fuels which are far from healthy. Unless foresight and intelligence are applied to the satisfaction of these people's needs, they may embrace the filthiest and most carbon-emitting forms of fossil-fuel energy as soon as they get the chance.”

The report concludes that a combination of growth and transparent government may be the only solution to avoiding this potential disaster. In fact, if developing countries were able to bypass the most polluting stages of their economic development, all parties would be better off.