All you people with kids, did you notice just how much packaging is involved with toys? Lucy even had one toy which included special holes just for attaching the toy to the packaging. Christmas has definitely opened my eyes to the disgraceful amount of packaging that heads its way directly to our landfills. James says that Amazon is working with manufacturers to create less packaging for the products that they ship, but mostly on a very quick trip to google I found that Europeans are a lot more concerned about this problem than Americans. I found this comment intriguing:
"I agree with you. Herea solution: In Zurich (Switzerland) the local authorities decided to reduce household trash. People have to buy garbage bags from the town at the cost of 5 Swiss Francs (approx $ 4.20 a bag. The result is positive. The city's trash came down by over 40 %. The supermarkets installed a space, after the cash registers, where consumers can unpack the goods they bought (cartons, foils plastic, wrapings etc. Thus, the volume consumers take home is much reduced and the trash remains at the supermarket (which has to dispose of it and bear the cost). This will force the supermarkets to think twice about packaging the goods they sell!Just to mention: The Zurich consumers also have to separate their trash: Metal, Plastic,Paper, Organic Matters. It is quite complicated and families need some space at home, where to keep all those bags.But, I think it is a good way out of the huge problems of our cities and their evergrowing trash mountains."
Any other ideas?
5 comments:
I think consumers should communicate their desire for less packaging directly to the companies that make all of the junk. Why expect the government to do our work for us? Write some letters to your favorite toy manufacturers...offer suggestions. I personally don't want to live in a country where the government tells me what to do in every facet of my life.
That is very interesting. My sister started us on recycling and it was amazing to see all the recyclable stuff we were just throwing away. I just have to find a drop off place here in Othello.
We have quite a few boxes still sitting on our back porch from Christmas because we don't have enough room in our trash can this week. We'll have to break them down and slowly slip the cardboard in with the rest.
I know the packaging with toys is horrible! In other areas like food though, making things from scratch reduces packaging considerably (and it's usually cheaper).
Hope you had a Merry Christmas..
Happy New Year!
-Laura
One more thing, I thought it was funny. The word verification for my comment was messes, quite appropriate :)
Amen, Lia. I think informing people to make the right decision (hopefully) is a better way to go. In the People's Republic of Portland, they are always adding fees to force recycling, but that isn't what encourages me. 5 cents here and there is not a biggie, but me going to the dummp really pits it into perspective for me. Buy handmade and less junk=less packaging. Oh...and furoshiki rocks.
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