Zero-Waste Eco-Friendly Lifestyle
Few days ago I have attended an event that is organized by Rotaract El Maadi around being eco-friendly and how to save our mother Earth at Degla Campus . This event was an eye-opener to me on how to live a sustainable life & save Earth. Even if I am still not living a zero-waste lifestyle, however I am trying hard to live a lower-waste lifestyle. The journey on 1000 miles, starts with only one step. During this event, I have learned about " Dawar ", " Go Clean ", " Nafeza ", " Greenish ", " VeryNile ", and " Dampa " who help in living an eco-friendly life that is saving our planet. Those initiatives will help you live consciously, buying eco-friendly products, recycling your trash consciously, and cleaning the environment around you with conscious. 1. "Dawar" is a street-cleaning application to capture a picture of places full of trash then the app connects it with the government to clean it capitalizing on the power of word of mouth & the power of social media. 2. "Go Clean" is an initiative that buys your trash to be recycled. They can buy plastics, papers, and cans. 3. "Nafeza" is a an initiative that produces hand-made paper from the agricultural waste. The notebooks are produced in different sizes and colors. 4. "Greenish" is a social initiative aims to design & implement sustainable environmental solutions to save money, create new revenue streams, and attract conscious customers. 5. "VeryNile" is an initiative co-created with "Greenish" to clean the river nile. 6. "Dampa" is an initiative that produces different cushions and bags that are produced from the scraps of cloth or the waste of cloth factories. One more economical benefit of buying Dampa is that they do empower women, as women handmade the products & a big portion of the proceeds go back to them to support their families. In addition to this, I have attended a talk by Hanaa Fouad who is living a zero-waste sustainable lifestyle. Where she has replaced all of her disposal items or plastic items with other replacements that produce no waste & can be reused or recycled. Hanaa decided to refuse all of the plastic straws, order her drinks in her glass/aluminum cups or bottles, take her leftovers in her containers, go shopping with her Tupperware to refuse plastic or foam packages. If she has to buy a packages product, she always goes with the big family sizes & reuse the packages again. Hanaa even is going the extra mile through doing her shampoo, deodorant, toothpaste herself to overcome the chemicals & the packaging. Isn't it a win-win situation? Some shocking 2019 statistics from National Geographic, plastic-pollution, and SAS websites; that encouraged me to start taking action are: - 8 million pieses of plastic flows to oceans daily. - Less than 1/5 of all plastic is recycled globally. - 1 million plastic bottles are sold every minute globally. - 50%-80% of turtles found dead because of ingesting plastic. Simply to start you need to know your trash, use reusable items instead of disposal ones, and make your own products as proposed by Lauren Singer. She is a woman from New York that is living a sustainable zero-waste life for years in a row. In the past 6 years, she only produced waste the fit in one jar I did my research later on & found the below tips that we can all do (one step at a time) to save our planet: - Buy a glass cup for your drinks instead of disposable ones. DONE - Use a reusable water bottle instead of plastic ones. DONE - Use "Ecosia" instead of "Google" for your searches to plant trees. DONE - Use cloth bags instead of plastic bags while shopping. - Refuse plastic straws. DONE - Use stainless steel/wood utensils instead of the disposal plastic ones. DONE - Use Bamboo toothbrushes instead of plastic ones. - Use wood combs and hair brushes instead of plastic ones. - Start collaborating with "Trash Recycle Service" instead of sending your trash to landfills by separating your trash into plastic, can, and paper. - Buy plastic-free beauty products and hygiene products. - Buy things in bulks and package free or in your own containers. - Use cloth towels instead of paper towels while cleaning. Now, it is your turn. You need to choose where will we go wisely & stop using single-use plastics.