Plastic shopping bags used for shopping and groceries are bags made from various kinds of plastic. People use them all over the world since the 1960s.These bags are sometimes called single-use bags, because people use them only once to carry things from a store to home, then throw them away.

The modern shopping bag is the invention of Swedish engineer Sten Gustaf Thulin. He developed a method of forming a simple, strong bag that could carry heavy things.

Some modern plastic shopping bags are recyclable or biodegradable. Because of their durability, most plastic bags can take centuries to decompose. Today, people throw away around 10 million tonnes of plastic waste a year, but recycle only a few percent of it. Nearly every piece of plastic ever made still exists today. We need to know that a plastic cup can take 50-80 years to decompose.

Many countries like China, Ireland, Australia, and Bangladesh have laws that restrict the sale of plastic bags. Each year millions of plastic shopping bags end up as litter in the environment. It is shocking that every year plastic bags and other plastic garbage thrown into the ocean kill as many as 1 million sea creatures such as whales, sea turtles, fish and even birds. Many animals ingest plastic bags, mistaking them for food and therefore die. And worse, the ingested plastic bag remains intact even after the death and decomposition of the animal. So it lies around in the landscape where another victim may ingest it. Plastic bags have made our lives easier in many ways. Unfortunately, they are often not disposed of properly.

Plastics have been around for 100 years, and they will be around for many more. Without a doubt, they are extremely useful. Some environmentally conscious consumers prefer to avoid plastic bags and ask for paper bags. And some go even further, just reusing the same cloth bag over and over again.