Sunday, 17 May, saw the celebration of World Recycling Day, an annual event that brings together numerous official bodies, non-governmental associations, citizens’ groups and others to raise awareness about the importance of suitable waste treatment in preserving the environment.
Here at the “Getting organic waste right” campaign we also wanted to joint this celebration and even went one step further and devoted an entire week to the subject of recycling and sustainability.
During this time the educational team launched awareness messages via social networks, encouraging the public to change some of their habits and offering ideas on how to succeed.
Using the basic principle of the 3 R’s (reduce, reuse and recycle) and thanks to 30-second photo montages, some easy-to-follow examples were shown for people to apply at home. The team also encouraged citizens to put other ideas into practice, such as repairing, redesigning, renovating or recovering materials so as to reverse the trend in waste treatment and management and finally shift away from a linear economy to a circular one.
During this awareness campaign week, one of the aspects we wanted to highlight is the difference between separating and recycling, an idea which still confuses many people.
At home we don’t recycle; we separate. That is, we prepare materials so they can go through the recycling process later; by doing so, we prevent them from going to landfill and we lend this waste a new lease of life as raw material for other processes. So, each and every one of us has a small responsibility to ensure these materials can be given new uses and prevent our natural resources from being overexploited.
However, in addition to these benefits, there are also other reasons for sorting and recycling, reasons that are not necessarily the same for everybody; the important thing is for each person to find their own, to reflect and to take action right away.
Whatever our own personal reasons, though, they are not the fundamental thing, but rather working together in the same direction to achieve a more sustainable world.
What about you? Will you also cooperate?