Blog Action Day - Reuse & Recycle

October 15, 2007

This is the day that you might feel another shift in the Universe. Just like when The Stern Report was published, Al Gore released ‘An Inconvenient Truth’ and Tim Flannery was named Australian of the Year. This is another major event that will ensure that environmental issues have a loud and very mainstream voice.

Climate Change is still the issue that affects us the most right now but I think that gets enough press and we all pretty much know what we need to do in our own lives to make the necessary changes. The concept of Reusing and Recycling is one we also need to embrace to slow down our dependence on resources.

Reuse & Recycle Tips

• Ask around your friends and family if you’re looking for something - you never know who may have what you need just sitting around going to waste.
• Get yourself some reusable shopping bags - plastic bags are so unnecessary and create major environmental problems.
• Instead of throwing things out - use ebay or have a garage sale.
• Council Clean-ups are a great source of items that might be useful and there’s that old saying that ‘one persons trash is another persons treasure’.
• Tell people you know if you have an item that you’re thinking of replacing - they may know someone who wants your old one.
• If you’re buying a new appliance - give the old worn out or broken one to your local repairman - he may just be able to fix it and pass it on to someone else.

New things are great but they put pressure on our scarce resources as we replace rather than looking for other options.

And speaking of buying new stuff, here’s a thought provoking article by the fabulous chrisg (another of my favourite bloggers) on the topic of think before you buy