Efforts to cut by half the number of plastic carrier bags supermarkets give their customers have narrowly failed.

超市试图将送给消费者使用的塑料购物袋缩减一半的努力失败了。

Discarded bags can kill small animals and birds

Last year seven supermarkets signed up to the voluntary scheme which aimed for a 50% cut in bags given out compared to figures recorded for 2006.

However figures suggest 346m fewer carrier bags are being used every month than they were in 2006.

Plastic bags harm the environment because they take a long time to decompose¹（分解） and can endanger wildlife.

In May 2006, 718m bags were being given out but by May 2009 this had almost halved²（对分，减半） to 372m, which amounts to a reduction of 48%.

In Scotland, the reduction was 49% representing 39m bags less in May 2009 compared to the same month is 2006.

Environment Secretary Hilary Benn said: "This is a great achievement by the seven supermarkets and their customers and it shows that by working together, we really can change our bag habits."

He praised retailers⁴（零售商） for putting a lot into the scheme, and said he was looking forward to further reductions in the months ahead.

Mr Benn added: "This means that several hundred million fewer carrier bags are going to landfill（垃圾堆） every month and we're using less raw materials to make them, which is great news."

The British Retail³ Consortium believes consumer behaviour has now changed, helped by supermarkets giving out free re-usable bags and awarding loyalty⁵ points to customers who bring their own bags.

As a result, some environmentalists are now calling for a charge of up to 15 pence for each disposable（用完即可丢弃的） carrier bag.