Carolyn, I'm wondering what kind of store you shopped at in the US.  Here (truly middle America, unlike either DC or Walla Walla) people usually put their oranges and carrots in separate bags so they can be weighed at the check-out counter, or the produce is prepackaged which is more and more common.  If you shop at the local produce market on Saturday, you tend to put your loose vegies together and re-use or tote your bags as well.  I think that in general the US does way more packaging, both prepackaging and onsite bagging, than most countries I'm fairly familiar with which is a pretty short list: Germany, Russia, England.  The exception in middle America (specifically urban Kentucky) is that a minority percentage of green-inclined people now tote their bags with them to any shopping opportunity and may re-use their plastic vegie bags as well.  We're doing better, in terms of single-use bags, but we have a long, long way to go.  Bulgaria doesn't sound THAT much different, except that you-all sound more inclined to toss plastic bags into the environment and not pick them up.  However, we have plenty of neighborhoods where that happens here as well.