Refuse or reuse - a motto for 2024
Sometimes I read something and it just makes me fizz. New ideas, great human stories, tales full of emotion and effort…Today I discovered this article in the Guardian by Joseph Winter – and it got the fizz going for me – I will paraphrase and leave you to read it yourself if you want to know more.
Alexandre Garcin had a big dream for his home town of Roubaix in France. His brain wave was simple: rather than cleaning up more and more trash off the city’s streets, why not produce less garbage in the first place?
So, in 2015, he got 100 volunteers to participate in a free, year-long pilot programme that would teach them how to live waste-free – or, at least with less waste than usual. They received training and support, had quantitative waste reduction targets, and weighed in their household rubbish regularly.
The Roubaix programme took what behavioural scientists call an “information-based” approach to change, which builds understanding and awareness through unambiguous instructions, forums, meetings, training and feedback.
The project focused on creating an identity around zero-waste and assigning families quantitative waste-reduction targets – strategies that are proven to be effective in other contexts, and everyone got pretty straightforward guidelines – for example, “don’t buy more food than you can eat.
According to Garcin, it’s actually “not that difficult” to halve a household’s waste production. Composting gets you most of the way there, since organic waste makes up about a third of the average French family’s municipal waste by weight. Another third is glass and metal, a significant chunk of which can probably be kept out of the landfill through recycling, and 10% is plastic, much of which can be avoided by finding reusable alternatives to plastic grocery bags, cutlery, packaging and other single-use items
Now here’s the guts of the thing: Seven in 10 cut their waste generation by 50%, and one in four reduced it by more than 80%.
The 800 families that Roubaix has trained since 2015 are likely to represent the most easily convincible slice of the city’s population – an estimated 1.8% of its 100,000 residents. It’s taken Roubaix nine years to reach this many people, and Garcin acknowledges that the rest of its residents will probably be harder to convert.
I was interested to note also that the project came against a national backdrop of intensive waste reduction. France has passed some of the developed world’s most ambitious waste-reduction policies; it was the first country in the world to ban supermarkets from throwing away unsold food, and one of the first to enshrine “extended producer responsibility” into law, making big polluters financially responsible for the waste they create, even after their items are sold.
In 2020, France passed a landmark anti-waste law that banned clothing companies from destroying unsold merchandise, required all public buildings to install water fountains, and proposed “repairability index” labels for certain electronic products.
What an inspiring story! Imagine an initiative like that here in our beautiful Mercury Bay or the whole the Coromandel! So, what did it take? Three key factors (Education/ Support, Conscious Action and Specific Targets). And who needed to be involved? National and local governmental and personal individual commitment.
I am in “boots and all” at the personal commitment level. My family would for instance, tell you we are a bit obsessive compulsive about efficiently recycling (sigh). But there is always the opportunity to improve when it comes to buying less, storing well and maximising use – and I am more than a little competitive truth be known. So I am definitely feeling motivated to achieve a 50% reduction in waste generation in our household. Yep, REFUSE and REUSE is our 2024 motto!
Meanwhile, Wahi Tukurua will continue to host, support and encourage initiatives that make it easy for everyone in our community to make great choices (e.g. Market stall based E-waste and Battery drives)
And we will continue our collaborative campaigning in 2024 (alongside other local heroes like Seagull Centre, Resource Recovery Centres, Thames Coromandel Food Waste Re-source Group, etc) to ensure our local government steps up to the plate with delivery on the Waste Minimisation outcome targets declared in TCDC Annual Plans, Long Term Plan and Waste Management and Minimisation Strategic Plan.
And alongside other zero waste and sustainability minded groups we will be lobbying central government for continuation and expansion of national strategies oriented at education and support of systemic change across the waste hierarchy.
Maybe as you bring your new year’s resolutions or annual challenges to life, you too, will consider ways to bring some Roubaix-like zero waste thinking into your daily living for 2024. Maybe bring your energy and enthusiasm to our Wahi Tukurua volunteer pool? Or participate in the Education and Support Programmes we will be hosting throughout the year (e.g., Single Use Cup Free campaign, REPAIR CAFÉ). Be sure to share your ideas with us on Facebook or via hello@wahitukurua.co.nz!
- Tracey Bell
MBRRCT Chair
