Reducing Waste

The Center for Urban Education and Sustainable Agriculture's weekly newsletter had a great article about reducing waste from packaging. Here's a great quote from the article, "According to a US EPA statistic from 2005, 31.2% of municipal waste is generated from packaging."

http://www.cuesa.org/cuesa/e-letter/archives/webmail-041108.htm

Packaging has multiple problems. The energy being used in generating the plastics plus the landfill space when disposing of this very temporary item. The Farmer's Market at The Ferry Building in SF is giving away free tote bags and encourgaing sellers/buyers to use reusable packaging. Great that this farmer's market is taking the next step in sustainability. Hopefully Oakland's markets will follow.

I notice when I cook more using fresh veggies we generate less trash. Take-out/fast food always generating the most. We can tell how healthy we are eating by looking in the garbage at the end of the week.

I'd say the majority of our plastic comes from those bags for fresh veggies. We try not to use them when possible but still do on smaller items like mushrooms. They are a pain in the ass to wash and reuse. I wish somebody would come up with a cheap sustainable alternative to these ubiquitous veggie bags.

For our exhibit, our classmate Chelsea is creating a tablecloth and napkins out of reused fabrics. It's Art and can be used again! We're asking fellow students to bring in cups/plates for themselves and another to share. That way we dont have to buy or throw anything out. Plus it makes us responsible and hopefully shows this skill to others attending.