Paper or Plastic? We have all become accustomed to this phrase and many of us have stood in line trying to decide which is the better choice. The answer is neither. By taking along your own reusable shopping bags you avoid the choice while making a difference for the environment. University of Illinois Extension has a new cloth shopping bag available that also promotes the Locally Grown message.

According to supermarket industry estimates, the average consumer uses 500 disposable paper and plastic bags a year. And that's only from grocery stores! Add in other stores and one consumer could easily go obtain over 1,000 bags a year. Grocery bags are not made from recycled paper and plastic bags are a product of the petroleum industry, a non-renewable substance. Very few plastic bags are actually recycled. Plastic bags end up in landfills, or along roadsides, rivers or in trees.

According to the Wall Street Journal, an estimated 500 billion to one trillion plastic bags are consumed world-wide every year. In the U.S. alone, an estimated 12,000,000 barrels of oil are required to produce the 100 billion consumed annually. Additionally, retailers spend an estimated $4 billion on their plastic store bags, passing the costs on to consumers. Paper isn't any better. According to the American Forest and Paper Association, in 1999 the U.S. alone used 10 billion paper grocery bags, requiring 14 million trees to be cut down.

By using reusable shopping bags you can cut back on hundreds if not thousands of those paper and plastic shopping bags that are harmful to our environment. The bags are available at the University of Illinois Extension office at 330 S. 36^th St. in Quincy and 111 W. Main St. in Mt. Sterling and TriState Nutrition in Quincy. The cost is $8 per bag and proceedsbenefit the Locally Grown program.

Locally Grown is a comprehensive effort to develop a sustainable local food system. The program includes many elements including building relationships between farmers and consumers, assisting producers in marketing their producers, creating consumer awareness of the importance of buying local, and educating youth on our local food system. For more information on Locally Grown visit www.extension.uiuc.edu/adams.