Food Waste

The following post is converted into AUD.

Food waste is something where sadly most of contribute. The USA alone, throw out 35 million tonnes and $210 billion of food is thrown out each year, that it only 365 days! Us Australians are not any better, we throw out 4 million tonnes and $8 million of edible food each year. We could fill 450,000 garbage trucks with our waste. Food waste is a growing problems and with these large numbers going away to rot, there are 795 million people who are currently undernourished and hungry. Australians on average throw out $19.90 each week so around $1, 036 each year per household.

It is not just the money we are throwing out but it also has environmental effects. When you thrown out your food you waste the already scarce water, fuel and other resources it took to get that food to your bin. When the food you throw away rots with the other organics in landfill, it gives off a greenhouse gas called methane. This gas is 25 times more potent than the carbon pollution that comes out of your car exhaust. Animals aren’t hunting anymore, instead they eat out of landfill and animal numbers are rising. With the 375 million word wide vegetarians, nobody is eating them so the ecosystem is unbalanced.

As consumers it is partly our fault that food waste exists. We expect perfection. Grocery stores throw away 20-40% of produce due to “imperfections” before it even reaches the shelves. Our high cosmetic standards aren’t only for ourselves but also for the food we eat! The banana may have some brown but they make the best banana bread. If we expect perfect produce we can also expect food waste. We can’t be picky about the food we eat. Food waste did not happen on it’s own, it happened because of us.

4Ocean

4Ocean is an organisation that aims to clean up our oceans and shores as well as create a more sustainable future for us to live in. Two young men named Alex and Andrew, surfers and ocean enthusiasts, took a trip to Bali. After surfing during the day they noticed local fishermen going out to fish during the night and coming to shore in the morning with barely any fish. They thought of a brilliant idea to help clean up the oceans. The boys employed sea captains to fish out the rubbish. They then create 100% recycled bracelets for sale. With beads made of glass and the rope made of plastic, they have fished it out of the ocean. In each bracelets there is one pound of trash. Each time you purchase a bracelet, you pull a pound. In 2017 alone, we have pulled over 250,000 pounds of trash from the oceans. There is now a subscription for you to pull a pound each month. I have pulled two pounds already.

How many pounds will you pull?

Shop you own bracelet here

Our New + Improved Packaging System

Keeping the planet safe is very important to us especially as a business. We have reduced our packaging majorly. This has impacted the way we package our products and has allowed an opportunity to include creativity. We have introduced many new systems into the business to make the world, our homes and lives a much more sustainable environment.

We used to wrap the soaps and scrubs in plastic wraps and containers. We realised that we wrap them up and then you go home and put the wrapping in the bin. This sparked an idea to get rid of this packaging all together. This is because its a waste of the earth resources to package our products in a harmful substance for “appeal and presentation”. We still want to make our products look beautiful but without damaging the earth. We came up with a few interesting and creative solutions to minimise the waste.

Recycling
We now put our lip scrubs into reusable metal containers and instead of wrapping our soaps in plastic, we now do “naked” packaging. This means instead of using the plastic we now don’t do wrapping at all except for the label. This helps us to reduce worldwide waste especially for things like plastic. These metal containers and labels can be returned for a discount on future purchases. This helps us because we don’t need to go out and purchase new containers which put a strain on the earth’s resources. For every undamaged and in good condition, 8 soap labels or 5 lip scrub containers you get a free product. This is as a thank you for helping the environment thrive.

Creating
When we create our products we stick to our rule; as little packaging as possible. So when we use the goats milk, plants, oils and other ingredients it has either none or very little packaging. Homegrown things are often used in the creation process of our products. The plants are all self grown, the oils are purchased through a company that has the same view as us, the other ingredients are all local and reusable. Such as the honey is local community honey that is in a reusable container.

Shop our new packaged products here: Store

How to Reduce Waste at Home

Sometimes people don’t see the little things that make a difference. Starting to reduce waste in your own home is a great start to draw the bigger picture. There are many simple ways to reduce your waste at home that won’t use up too much of your time or your money but rather will save you that.

1. Get rid of plastic bags – This one is pretty straight forward, invest in some good quality, sturdy reusable bags. There are many that can fold up and easily fit into your handbag for an emergency run to grab groceries. Keeping a few in the car can also come in handy.

2. Start composting – You can easily set up your own composting bin at home for not much money. It doesn’t have to be big, it can be a small one but this has a big impact. Rather than throwing out your food scraps you can give it back to your garden, everybody wins.

3. Reusable containers – This is also very simple, keep your spices, pasta, rice and other ingredients in airtight glass jars. Not only do they look pretty, you are saving the planet.

4. Learn to sew – If you know how to do this then instead of throwing away clothes you can mend that little rip or that loose thread. The USA throws out over 15 million tonnes of textiles each year! Just by learning to repair them can make that whopping number decrease.

5. Cancel mail – Request not to receive junk mail and limit the amount of magazine subscriptions to sign up for. Request online copies for school news letters. This way we are saving the paper and effort it takes to get to your home and straight in the bin.

6. Ditch the bottles – Stop buying plastic water bottles, instead invest in some really good quality reusable water bottles. They make them in really cute styles so you don’t have to stick with a simple one, you can go all out!

7. Plan meals – This can reduce food waste, you won’t buy too much if you have the exact measurements on hand.

8. Buy used toys – This means you won’t have to go and invest in an expensive toy you can get for cheaper, is just as good and saves it from being thrown away.

9. Sell your stuff – If you have things you don’t want anymore, this could be someone else’s treasure. You are making extra cash for something you were going to throw away too.

10. Do it online – Have your bank statements and bills sent to you by email rather than by mail. Also Read the mail online, this way you are saving a lot of paper.