[Film Marocain Zero Torrent
Laurice Whack
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I am used to carrying totes in my car for the weekly run to grocery markets when I lived in California. Some of my totes are from my Fulbright days in Morocco, including the now impossible to find woven plastic bags with hard plastic handles. I bought the reusable sacs as I was appalled by the fields of plastic fluttering in the breeze visible from the train between Tangier south or along the highways linking Mediterranean cities.
In 2015, California became the first in the United States to pass a state-wide ban on single-use plastic bags under Senate Bill 270. The law, which has yet to be fully enforced though it is widely practiced, may have started in 2007 when the city and county of San Francisco banned the bags. Protests against the law persist, including Proposition 67, which may overturn the California senate bill.
On June 5, shortly before Ramadan, the Moroccan government enacted Law 77-15 banning the creation, importation, export, sales, and use of plastic sacs under an operation called Zro Plasique or Zero Plastic. The program lasts between June 5 and October 2016 and is organized by local governors or walis. The law comes as Morocco seeks to project the appearance of being one of the most environmentally conscious nations in Africa if not the world, according to an Al Jazeera article, though the title may go to Rwanda and South Africa, other African nations who have banned the bags previously. In November 2016, Marrakesh, Morocco will host of the twenty second session of the Conference of the Parties (COP 22 or COP22).
The Zero Plastic program includes Zro Mika piloted by the Moroccan Coalition for Climatic Justice (Coalition marocaine pour la justice climatique or CMJC), a collection of two hundred Moroccan organizations, associations, and civil society and social movements networks unions created on February 7, 2016 in Rabat. CMJC is also known for its volunteers who collected plastic litter around Casablanca shortly after its creation.
Goals of the Zero Mika program include informing the public, or, at least those who have Internet and televisions, about how the mikat also known as sachets plastiques, are bad for the health and environment; and what cloth, paper, and reed and palm alternatives one can use, according to a Medias24 article and television commercials I have seen on 2M, among other stations. My local corner store is also distributing fliers in Arabic and French on recycled paper. Zro mika was launched on July first, just before the end of Ramadan on July six to seven, at least for the Moroccans who do not fast an extra seven days after Ramadan ends.
As the ban moves forward, I still see some bags used by persons coming home from clothing shopping. Like many in Morocco, I retain a small collection before the ban, including the coveted black bags. Use of the bags will have to stop, or we all face fines under the law.
Carrefour: the French super giant that used to sell under Label Vie in Morocco now uses thick paper bags the weight of which one assumes has been removed from scales recalibrated to acknowledge their heaviness. They are found in two sizes and the man weighing my groceries was happy to mix up the vegetables and fruits into one bag that did not break as I took it home. These bags are a little like those used to wrap the French pastries like croissants or petite pain in the new city bakeries, like La Comdie or Le Petite Bul.
Corner store (hanout): he asked if I wanted a mika and did not insist when he saw mine. Another that is more like a mini supermarket is selling paper bags and basket like I see for sale in the Marche Centrale and used in movies about life in Provence France but rarely in the Moroccan marketplaces, except once or twice is Essaouira. I wonder if his business and that of the other reed weavers will pick up this year? I think of the reed matt vendor who just passed in Sale and another vendor in the Central Market (March Central) of Fez, not to mention the vendors who sell in the weekly marketplaces, increasingly harder to find as the land on the outskirts of cities are developed. Another corner store wrapped my soap purchase in pieces of plain paper.
Marche Central: I did not see young men and older ladies selling the larger bags for use in the marketplace and one of my preferred vendors still had some of the filmy bags, if I wanted one. Just outside, at the vegetable stalls not far from the mosque entrance and Carrion flagship store, my preferred stall owner offered me thin paper bags that fell apart into mushy mounds before I got home.
Ironically, from my experience, the single-use plastic bags are usually reused in Morocco. They are washed or not, and then given away by vegetable and used clothing vendors in the old madina or old city, for example, where one typically finds the street markets.
Another ironic observation is that most of the plastic trash in Morocco that I have noticed does not only come from the single-use bags for groceries, but also the plastic containers and wrappings, especially for Yogurt drinks, snack food, and candy bars. They form the litter along the beaches and the sidewalks. Will these be banned too?
Finally, when will Morocco enact a nation-wide official recycling and repurposing program like that I see inhabitants practicing? Creative use of plastic water bottles and cans is an art par excellence in Morocco and visible as one walks around the cities, especially in the working class neighborhoods. I place plastic water bottles by the side of the trash cans so trash pickers can come and take them. Mine come by with their hand wheeled carts or bicycles usually in the evenings.
Colette Apelian (Ph.D.) is an art and architectural historian based in Rabat. She writes about art, food, and visual cultures in Morocco, among other topics. The art of the plastic bags is documented in her book Shopping in Morocco: the Art of the Plastic Bag (Bay House Publications 2015).
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