Plastic free Challenge !

Hello everyone today’s article is a little challenge for you. To help you realize how much plastic you use every day and how small everyday’s actions can make you and our planet feel better.

Here are five situations where we use plastic and we actually don’t need to. Each of them as a tip to stop or reduce plastic use.

We are officialy launching the Plastic Free Week Challenge.

Tip #1 : One use Plastic bags at the grocery shop

We all have this feeling when you went a bit overwhelm at the grocery store and didn’t plan to get so much staff. Then you realize that your bag is waaaaay to small for all of it and you have no other choice than taking 2 or 3 one-use plastic bags !!!

Well for this situation we have a scale of tips.

• Level 1 : Beginner

Well if you have no choice you are not going to hell for that, obviously, it happens to everyone but you still can do something about it.

DON’T THROW IT AWAY !!! You still can use it either you take one or two in your bag like that next time you’ll be able to use it again It is still one less plastic bag lost in the nature. You can use it for your plastic trash. Like that you don’t need to buy some as you already have one and you even gave it a new life !!

• Level 2 : Awaken

You can still choose the one use plastic bag. But if you don’t already know it, shops are also selling other plastic bags actually made from reused plastic. Those one are waaay more solid but also they are sold with a small pocket that you can put them into. It’s so small you won’t even notice it until you need it !

• Level 3« Master Level » : NO MORE PLASTIC BAGS !!

As students we already have backpack so let’s us it ! When you know that your stopping by to the grocery shop a few times a week split your list and carry it in you own bag and it’s better for your back 😉

But we are not all students, I’m thinking also about grown up adult with or without families that do big grocery shops. Well be aware that you can find bags made in fabric that you can use for many things and they are more convenient and solid than plastic bags.

Tips #2 Reduce the use of plastic wrapping in grocery store.

This challenge seems impossible due to all the things that are wrap in plastic : vegetables, bread, meat… But you can first be aware of it and then try to change it. For exemple when you buy your vegetables you don’t need to take one plastic bag per kind of vegetables you can put all of them in your cart (with caution). Actually in France (as we have some french people in our team), there is no longer this kind of plastic bags it’s been replaced by paper bags.

Tip #3 Cups and bottles

For the cups I’m going to take local exemple. Here in HSN, we have volunteers whom are throughing a small meeting for those who wants to drink coffee or tea and play boarding games. But they noticed that when they let one-use cup available there were a lot of waste. So they communicated about it and ask people to bring their own cup. This is the kind of action that matters. For exemple if your working in an office when there is only one-use cup or glasses, take your own !

And instead of buying coffee or tea you can make your own at home like that you are free to put whatever you want in it and keep it warm all day with a thermos flask.

It’s the same for plastic bottles, you don’t need to buy a new one you can reuse one or even better buy a flask that you can carry every where with you an fill it at a water point. It’s going to be less expensive for you and also more responsible.

Tip #4 : Reuse boxes and jars.

A lot of our plastic trashes are from one-use wrapping we made a close up on cups and bottles but there is a lot of other way to restrain our use of plastic. For exemple, lunch box, a lot of student premade there food and might not re use it later. Some stuff that your by can have a second life, like glass jar can be use as kitchen storage furnitures. And some plastic boxes as lunch box.

Tip #5 : Stop using one-use products

Without noticing, we are wasting a lot of plastic there is a lot more of small action you can do everyday. Stop using plastic glass for exemple or plastic cutlery it doesn’t take more effort to take metal ones for a pic nic. Or using the paper plates instead of plastic ones. Starting to realize your consumption of plastic is the first step to reduce and improve it.

Feel free to share other ideas about it with us and be part of this adventure. It is our responsability to change our way of living. Even a small step it is still a step further.

Please support and help organisations and movements such as: http://boomerangbags.org who makes beautiful reusable bags, and

https://4ocean.com who does a wonderful work for the environment and our oceans!