What can I do as an individual to contribute?

We have been learning about what companies are doing in order to be more sustainable and create a shared value for about a month now. It is fascinating to see a lot of companies consider being sustainable a cost efficient strategy rather than a corporate social responsibility. No doubt big corporations have the biggest impact on environment and they can influence a bigger change as they are responsible for 70% of the gas emissions in the world. However as I get more informed about this topic, I started to ask myself what I can do in order to contribute, other than supporting greener companies.

I started my research by simply googling "what an individual can do in order to contribute to sustainability". I found some basic information that I already knew and try to do in my daily life like recycling, supporting green companies, use public transportation etc. But what else could I do? A week ago I saw a video of Lauren Singer on my Facebook feed. She is a young girl from NYC with a bachelor degree of environmental studies who claims to live a zero waste life. That caught my attention. She has a personal blog that she shares a lot of great information and her journey about how she manages to fit her all waste that she produced in the past four years in a mason jar. She also has a YouTube channel. Some of her videos are about how to make zero waste toothpaste, deodorant, lotion, detergents and how to shop zero waste etc.

I will post the links to her Ted Talk, YouTube channel and personal blog as well as a zero waste family's blog from California, but here are two new ways that I decided adapt to my life after my research.

 1. Make your own green home cleaning & care products: They are non toxic for us and much better for the environment. Of course as a student I do not have the time to make all of them but for instance making a non toxic deodorant involves only mixing baking soda, coconut oil and some optional essential oil. It involves no chemicals and so easy to make.

2. Use less/no plastic bags while shopping & buy in bulk & support local produce: I already bring my own bag for grocery shopping but I tend to put vegetables and fruits in different plastic bags, I do not have to do that. Buying in bulk is not only cheaper but also means less packaging. In addition, I will try to go to a farmers market instead of a supermarket to buy fresh local produce. UBC Farm has a market and we can see the location each week from an interactive map on their website.

I hope we can all realize we do have an impact on the environment and what we do matter.

Here are the links:

Lauren's YouTube Channel

Lauren's Blog

 Lauren's Ted Talk

Zero Waste Home - Zero Waste Family's Blog



Comments

  1. Tess17 October 2017 at 21:24

    Thanks for this Aylin,

    I am curious to hear how your endeavor to add more sustainable measures into your own life.

    Great work with the blog post, the hyperlinks and photos add interest for the reader. Keep these things in mind as you tackle the rest of the blog posts.

    Keep posting! Looking forward to ready more.
    Tess

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Fast Fashion Alternatives

Image
In the world of consumerism, fast fashion has a huge place. Trends are changing rapidly every season and there is a big group following them. I think everyone would agree with me when I say, fast fashion brands like H&M and Forever 21, do not manufacture the highest quality products. Their low quality is often being justified by the low price tag. However, I realized my low quality clothes do not last for a long time at all. So I keep buying and buying. At the end of the day, I probably spend more money than if I had purchased a limited amount of high quality items. As I started to be more aware about sustainability, my fashion taste also changed. There is a growing number of companies that try hard to be eco-friendly and to contribute to sustainability. There is no doubt Patagonia is a great example. They use organic cotton in their products, they encourage buying less and they have a line made from recycled materials. I wondered what other companies are out there that do diffe...
Read more

Hydroponics

Image
Have you ever heard of hydroponics? It's a sub category of hydroculture and it means growing plants without soil, using mineral nutrient solutions in a water solvent. Is hydroponics a sustainable alternative to soil gardening? There are different opinions about that. I checked a couple of sources to find some pros and cons and I will summarize the most important aspects. First of all, hydroponics uses 90% less water than traditional soil gardening. The reason is that the water can be reused by adding more solutions to it which is amazing. Also, it takes less time to grow more vegetables and herbs by hydroponics. There is no need for harsh chemicals to fertilize soil, there is no dependence on the climate or season and it requires less human labour since it can be fully controlled remotely. Moreover, hydroponic farms take less space and it can be built vertically! (it's almost too good to be true, right?) Here is a photo of a vertical hydroponic garden The green produc...
Read more