{"id":4690,"date":"2019-08-16T12:29:42","date_gmt":"2019-08-16T09:29:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/africasustainabilitymatters.com\/?p=4690"},"modified":"2026-01-11T05:30:28","modified_gmt":"2026-01-11T05:30:28","slug":"zero-waste","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/2019\/08\/16\/zero-waste\/","title":{"rendered":"Be Zero Waste \u2013A Culture Away From Trash"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The average man generates\n0.16kg \u2013 5.7kg of waste per day<\/a>. That is an average of 1.6 thousand pounds of\nwaste per person a year. At first, this news is shocking but then I realized it\nmakes sense. Our entire society revolves around disposable products. In a day\nyou might throw out your morning coffee cup, an empty chip bag, a candy\nwrapper, a banana peel, a finished can of diet soda, a couple of tissues, some\ntowels or a bag full of paper boxes, napkins, and straws from the gate through.\nIt all adds up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What if we all made no trash? <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I never really thought\nabout this question until I watched an old movie of my grandparents having a\npicnic in the 1960s. There was something unusual about it. Compared to the\npicnics we all have today, there was no trash. Everything that they unfolded\nand lifted from their picnic baskets was reusable. Stainless steel cups, real\nutensils, reusable napkins, food packaged in glass containers. This got me\nthinking. Why can\u2019t we live sustainably?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Realizing\noneself as a part of the solution is the first step towards living sustainably.\nEverything you toss in your bin every day is part of the problem. Our trash\ntells a story about what we value. Back in the olden days, not much was thrown\naway. Nearly everything had a longer lifespan. When you bought something, it\nwas supposed to last, reusable, durable and repairable. There was value and\nbelonging in materials. You took care of your stuff. Simplicity, resourcefulness,\nand thrift were a normal part of everyday life. Throwing something out after\njust one use was a Never!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We live in a linear economy<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fast\nforward today, much of what we consume is designed to be used once and tossed\noff. Most products today are designed to have a limited lifespan. We\nmanufacture stuff for the landfill and forget its sustainability. Thinking of\nrecycling is not the ultimate answer. Recycling is wonderful. But it is not the\nsolution to our problem. As you can see, we are discarding over a billion\npounds stuff a day. If it were all recyclable that would take a lot of energy,\ngas, water, transportation, and labor. Instead of viewing recycling as the\nalmighty answer, it should be the last report.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With\nthe increasing amount of materials being created locally, we simply produce too\nmuch for recycling to make a difference. We need to produce and dispose of\nless. The results of this toss and go culture has led us somewhere to an\nignored conversation about material misuse and about the environmental impact\nthe throw-away culture has had on the planet. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rethinking our waste<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Zero waste pantry| Photo by goingzero.com<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

It is time for us to rethink our waste. Think of the energy it takes to extract and create a material all to be molded into an object like a plastic cup, fork, plate, straw, which only be used for mere minutes and then discarded forever. Where is the respect and value of the material?\u00a0 Take an example of a leaf. When it falls from a tree, it doesn’t stay down forever. A leaf is designed to be re-absorbed back to the Earth as nutrients for centuries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Zero waste is not about producing and consuming nothing. It is about carefully and intentionally designing, producing and consuming without waste as an end- product. What if we designed and produced materials to be used again and again? That which is to be released back to the environment without harm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What\namount of waste do you and your family produce? To build a culture of less\nwaste, here is a challenge for each one of us:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Simplify<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Less\noverwhelmed and less distracted. This helps discover our true wants and needs.\nIt puts meaning back into our belonging and experiences. We discover the value\npf ownership rather than consuming for convenience alone. Intentional and\nmeaningful consumer zone allows us to focus on products that are lasting and\nreusable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Move from Disposable Lifestyle to a\nRe-usable lifestyle<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The single most powerful action you can do to create less waste is to refuse single-use disposable products – anything we use once and toss off. For nearly every disposable item you can think of, there is a money-saving and lasting alternative.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Read also: Fish Leather Contribution To Sustainable Fashion\ufeff<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Embrace community and consumer power<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Let us invest back in our community by creating sharing programs. Community gardens, composting options and embracing local craftsmanship and artisan. We can give companies incentives to create positive change by using our voices to encourage better product design and recovery. We can encourage our local entities to give up single-use materials and embrace more re-usable and sustainable options. Our consumer voices contain more power than you know.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Using\nthese three techniques, each one of us can dramatically reduce the personal\nwaste stream and shift the way our communities think about waste. No matter\nwhere we live.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

What\nif we lived in a zero-waste world? The future may not be too far off. Many\nbusinesses are blooming from the zero-waste mindset. Zero waste markets are\npopping up in the US, Canada, and Europe, which can work for Africa too. A\ngrowing zero-waste blogging and social media community offer insight into\ncreating a life of less waste. Laws are also being adopted globally to ban the\nuse of single-use plastic bags with Kenya leading the example for Africa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rethink\nyour trash footprint and start living a life of more simple and sustainable.\nZero-waste lifestyle is not about being perfect, it is about embracing\nresourcefulness and community. It is about inspiring each other and using our\nvoices c collectively to live by example in the middle of a throw-away culture.\nIt is truly about putting value in things that we all use.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The average man generates 0.16kg \u2013 5.7kg of waste per day. That is an average of 1.6 thousand pounds of waste per person a year. At first, this news is…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":4691,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":"","pagelayer_contact_templates":[],"_pagelayer_content":"","_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[92],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4690","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-environmental-responsibility"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4690","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4690"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4690\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4691"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4690"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4690"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4690"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}