The use of plastic, a marketing boon has turned into a bane for mankind. Ease of packaging and carrying is turning into an unimaginable health and economic hazard.

Plastic bags are becoming one of the biggest sources of pollution in Saudi Arabia though many countries have switched over to environment-friendly packaging materials, according to an article in the Arabic daily Al Watan.

In Saudi Arabia, such environmental pollution continues unchecked due to an absence of safe ways to dispose of plastic bags and also because of lack of awareness of the hazards involved and interest on the part of the public and business to address the issue.

“The kingdom’s indigenous plastic industries meet 70 per cent of its demand for plastic bags and packaging material,” explained Mazen Khaled Kuttibi, an environment conservation expert at the Jeddah Chamber of Commerce and Industry.

Plastics endanger the environment because, unlike paper that is an organic product, they take 10-15 years to decompose and integrate into the soil. During this time, plastics can choke the soil or the reefs where they eventually end up snagged.

“But then paper is not quite an alternative,” Kuttibi said. “Paper industries also adversely affect the environment because manufacturers need to cut down trees to use it in paper industries, a matter that causes deforestation,” he added.

So, at a time when Europe and India forbid the use of the plastic bags in stores, most of the groceries and supermarkets in the kingdom use plastic bags lavishly.

“I was shocked first time I saw plastic bags used so generously at the supermarkets here, almost as many plastic bags as the items purchased,” said T. Bennet, a Briton in Jeddah.

Down the reefs, the problem is huge, added Sabir Sheikh Hassan, a rescue diver who frequently takes part in reef cleaning programmes and organises environment safety campaigns.

Ahmed Al Ghamdi, manager of a supermarket in Jeddah, said they give out more than 50,000 plastic bags daily.

He said that although most of the consumers and business owners know very well the great damage plastics cause to the environment, still they do not adopt any anti-pollution measure in their daily life. That explained the reason behind the increase in skin allergy and diseases affecting the upper respiratory tract and spread of malignant diseases.

Though not a doctor, he was right in his observation about the health hazard. Plastic waste in most forms can only be disposed of by burning and cannot be recycled. Scientists say that burning plastic causes carbon dioxide emission into the atmosphere, which pollutes the air and significantly contributes to the spread of cancerous diseases, especially lung cancer.

Environmentalists do not have a precise figure of the quantity of plastic bags used daily in a busy city like Jeddah, which has an estimated population of more than three million people. However, they put the size of the daily trash generated by every individual in Jeddah at 2.2 kg.