Going green: Plastic vs biodegradable items

Many of the items we use in everyday life are harming the planet as they're not biodegradable. Each plastic bag that we have used will survive for a million years and keep releasing harmful gases that cause global warming. But plastic bags aren't the only culprits. Disposable diapers take between 500 and 600 years to degrade as well. A can of our favourite soft drink takes 200 to 500 years. And we cannot even begin to calculate how long a glass bottle or styrofoam glass takes. So do we give up everything then? The answer is 'no'. But perhaps it is better to live by the rule that if we do dump something on the earth, we should at least let it be something that degrades at least in our lifetime. A cotton rag takes 5 months to degrade whereas a banana peel takes about 3-4 weeks. Again, a paper bag takes about 5 months. The best option is to take our own cloth bag. It may take us a minute more, but saves the earth millions of years of hard work.