WHERE IS AWAY?

When you say you are ‘throwing it away’, where exactly is ‘away’? That term has been used for many years but what it really means is ‘take it somewhere where I can’t see it and you deal with it’. Whilst this area is renowned for its composting, we still have the very ugly sight of many wheelie bins stuffed to the top with all forms of waste. I don’t believe, as a farmer and mother and composter, that all that rubbish brimming from the top of the bins is not reusable or compostable.

‘Throw away’ is a buzzword in marketing to encourage consumerism. Consumerism has helped us feel ‘less gutlty’ and more accepting of those replacement supermarket bags rather than bags like the Morse bags available in Bangalow.

The fact that we should be using‘recycled’ material bags – seems irrelevant in today’s slick marketing world. So, those companies who are not using sustainable packaging are happy for us to be lulled into a false sense of security making ‘away’ a place where we bury waste, seriously poisoning our environment with festering food and chemicals in the sea and ground, a sad indictment of our stupidity when it comes to being manipulated by advertising.

Now dear listener, you may say, ‘Well, Cath must have been looking at someone else’s garbage, that’s not me’. But haven’t we all (including yours truly) thrown food into the bin because we were is a hurry or just couldn’t be bothered? In a utopian world we should be able to compost our own local village waste and use it for our nutritional soil needs, but short of this we have to stop the problem at its source. This means significant changes from manufacturers, packaging methods and most of all, from the consumer. We need better choices in what we buy, not only as consumers of that product but the ones who are going to ‘recycle’ it. Pressure needs to be born by the producer/marketer for their responsibility to the earth also. This is not scaremongering by a few environmentalists; this is a stark reality that we just can’t ignore.

So, selective informed consumerism is what it’s all about; this is a consumer choice and sends a strong message to manufacturers that certain ‘eco-friendly’ products are more popular and thus they should produce for that market. Why should we be manipulated by them? - lets turn it around. Hopefully, when this happens the wheelie bins will be less full. It is everybody’s responsibility to produce less waste. We are making a choice to be part of the answer rather than part of the problem by considered action.

Here’s a thought – what if the wheelie bins were made out of clear plastic? Maybe not. See you next month.

Cath

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