Zero Waste Living
What does Zero Waste mean?
The term Zero Waste started out as an industry term for manufacturing processes. It is based on a set of principles aiming to send as little waste to landfills, incinerators and into our nature as possible.
"Zero Waste: The conservation of all resources by means of responsible production, consumption, reuse, and recovery of products, packaging, and materials without burning and with no discharges to land, water, or air that threaten the environment or human health."— Zero Waste International Alliance
The Zero Waste principles can implemented on multiple levels in our
society. For example, many Zero Waste municipalities already committed
to the goal of continuously reducing waste generation, read more about
Zero Waste Cities 👉
here. Or businesses can turn to a circular economy, read more on circular
Zero Waste Businesses 👉
here.
However, you as an individual can implement easy changes into your own
life 💪 ♻️!
The Zero Waste lifestyle movement and the 5 Rs
In 2008, Bea Johnson put her family on a waste diet and implemented year she started to blog about (Zero Waste Home) and many others started to follow her! She implemented the 5 R's rule as a motto to follow.
- Refuse what you do not need (single use packaging)
- Reduce what we need (stop the mindless shopping of low quality goods)
- Reuse what we already have (jars, containers, bottles and bags to buy food, repair items, buy secondhand)
- Recycle what we cannot reuse (ideally there should be very little left to recycle)
- Rot the rest (compost food waste)