Swamp Stomp

Volume 18 Issue 22

“Paper or plastic?” It’s a question often heard at the checkout line at the grocery store. For some, this question is insignificant, just another part of the customer service process. But for others, this question is very important, a step needed to help end the mass production of trash that is choking our planet.

Every week on some assigned day, almost all of us perform a necessary ritual. It is the day where we take our trash to the street. It is almost second nature at this point: take the trash outside to the street and by the end of the day, it will have all disappeared. But that trash goes to a landfill and that landfill does not completely break the trash down into non-harmful substances that can go back into the earth. Much of that trash cannot be broken down and can sometimes leak chemicals that poison groundwater that eventually makes its way to the ocean. What follows is often the destruction of ocean habitats and damage to our ecosystems. True, there are a plethora of regulations in place that try to prevent this from happening and they are helpful to a degree. However, a better way would be to just reduce the amount of trash that we produce.

The so-called “zero-waste movement” aims to reduce the amount of trash created each year. This movement is headed primarily by a group of women who have been able to cut down on the amount of trash that they create so much that their yearly trash is able to fit into a Mason jar. The zero-waste movement has five main principles: refuse, reduce, reuse, compost, and recycle. The first principle (refuse) is considered the most important. In order to minimize waste, zero wasters do not buy food that comes in packaging. And if they do, they buy in bulk. The small wrappers on vegetables we buy may seem insignificant, but the amount of plastic really adds up over the course of a year. Additionally, buying in bulk not only cuts down on the plastic waste, but it also saves zero-wasters lots of money. Kathryn Kellogg, a proponent of the zero-waste movement from Vallejo, California, states, “We also saved about $5,000 a year by purchasing fresh food instead of packaged, buying in bulk, and making our own products like cleaners and deodorant.”

Kellogg and other supporters of the zero-waste movement realize it is not an easy task to go from producing an average of 1,500 pounds of trash a year to zero pounds. However, they believe that every act which reduces trash is important. They point out that making even the simplest of changes can help the planet, such as switching out paper napkins with a cloth towel. When people hear of the zero-waste movement, they often initially believe it is some new radical idea. Kellogg says. “But it’s not a radical act to clean up a kitchen spill with a cloth towel instead of a paper towel.” Every little action counts.

You may not be able to limit yourself to a Mason jar’s amount of trash, but even producing one pound of trash less per person on earth could be extremely significant. The zero-waste movement may not radically change your life, but it does make you think about the importance of the tiny plastic wrappers that cover our vegetables and other unnecessary packaging. Just changing one wasteful habit could start to change the world.

Sources:

Leahy, Stephen. “How People Make Only a Jar of Trash a Year.” National Geographic. National Geographic. 18 May 2018. Web. 22 May 2018.