Seed idea in the bag

FOUR Ballarat Grammar students have launched their Crazy Ideas College initiative at one of the city’s supermarkets in order to promote sustainable packaging and gardening.

Since early last month, the pupils’ paired seeds and biodegradable bags have been a fixture at Ryan’s IGA’s Northway branch.

The idea was developed by year 10 students Lauren Bodman, Sophie Lambourn, Lucy Quinlan and Lizzy Day who said it was “exciting” to see it used in a store.

“As soon as we put the bags on the shelves, we noticed people immediately started using them probably not even knowing they were biodegradable,” she said.

“We all picked ‘environment’ as a focus for our Crazy Ideas College idea. We realised there’s a problem with excess plastic at produce sections.”

Made from corn by-products, the bags were produced with a $2000 grant from Grampians Central West Waste and Resource Recovery Group and the young entrepreneurs also used their $400 prize for winning the Alfredton Rotary Club’s inaugural environmental competition.

The bags were purchased from New South Wales-based company Compost-A-Pak while the group created seed inserts from recycled paper supplied by Ballarat Grammar.

The store has so far stocked about six boxes of 40 rolls each containing 400 bags.

Four seed options are available including Californian poppy, lettuce, tomato and parsley seeds.

Ms Lambourn said she feels like they’re “leading the way” for younger people using biodegradable packaging.

“It feels like we’re kind of setting an example of what could be implemented by showing that a trial like this can be successfully run in pretty much any community store,” she said.

“It’s good for our generation, to show that we do care about our environment and that it matters. Hopefully other businesses around will start to adopt sustainable packaging.”

The group is aiming to implement the bags in other stores throughout Ballarat.