Habits You Can Form to Reduce Garbage in Your Home
Reducing the amount of garbage that you produce starts with taking small steps and being consistent with them so they can add up to have a significant overall effect. Here are the many different ways how you can really put the three R’s into practice:
Don’t buy bottled water.
Bottled water takes up a lot of resources to produce single-use products that take too long to decompose. If you really need to drink water, you’re better off buying your own water bottle that you can fill up with normal tap water, which is often safe to drink.
If you love having your coffee on the go, you can even choose to invest in a metal thermos instead of drinking from a paper cup every time.
Minimize take-away.
You’re better off cooking or preparing your own food yourself. If you don’t have the time to make elaborate meals for any reason, opt for foods that you can easily eat on the go, such as trail snacks and fruits.
Not only will food taste much better (you’re using fresh ingredients, and you worked on it yourself), but you also get to cut down on single-use containers you would throw away whenever you order take-away from your favorite restaurant.
Bring your own re-usable bags.
Plastic bags may be cheap, easy to get, and really convenient, but they also take really long to naturally degrade (depending on the type of plastic used, it can take as many as four hundred). These days, having re-usable cloth bags for your groceries or when you go to the marketplace is a great way to cut down on your carbon footprint.
The same can be said when you order take-away. As much as possible, bring a lunchbox and ask the staff to place the food in your lunchbox instead of having it in single-use containers or plastics.
Use cloth napkins and hand towels in your kitchen.
This may not seem much (and there’s a good chance you’re already doing this), but using cloth instead of using tissue paper or paper napkins can go a long way in reducing the amount of trash you make overall.
No need to keep buying new ones when it comes to cloth napkins and hand towels – simply wash and let dry and you can use them again.
Know your local laws on recycling.
The good news is that in Singapore, you have easy access to detailed guidelines when it comes to segregating waste and recycling, and you only need to ask around if you’re confused. Most HDB blocks and privately-owned properties in residential areas also have large recycling bins where you can easily dispose your waste.
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