for our future generations of tomorrow
Everything that humanity has needed to survive and thrive – food, water, shelter, medicine, and so much more – has been given to us by nature. There is no doubt that without nature, humanity would lead a very miserable existence, if not cease to exist entirely. Even after all the damage we have done to nature, she continues to keep providing humankind with more than we ever deserve.
I’m sure we all have all been taught as children that it is not good to keep taking from others, and at some point we must also give back too. Can we not apply the same principle with nature? If not for our sake or for nature’s sake, then at the very least for our children’s sake.
The following are 6 straightforward, yet highly effective ways to give back to the environment around us:
Reduce, reuse, recycle
Reduce the amount of waste generated by you,
reuse items as far as you can before throwing them out,
recycle whenever possible, and how ever much possible.
The 3Rs form the prerequisite of sustainable living. But honestly, how many of us are actually able to pull this off?
Here is a breakdown to make things simpler:
Reducing is all about generating as less waste as possible. And the first step to doing this is by making intentional purchases. This will ensure that – a) you are buying & using only what you need, and b) some/a lot of what you’re using can be reused.
Reusing is perhaps the most straightforward of the three, wherein you should get the most number of uses from a single given product, before replacing/throwing it out. Another great benefit of doing this is that it’s economical for you.
Recycling breathes new life into already used products (or its components), making them useful again. This is the step that involves the most creativity and experimentation, which if done correctly can be incredibly beneficial for the environment.
Saying no to plastic
Simply put, plastic spells death for literally every biological ecosystem and its inhabitants living in them. Yes, that includes us too. With some countries having banned single use plastic, it should be more clear than ever that plastic should have no place in our lives anymore. Simply eliminating the use of plastic will go a long way in reducing the waste generated as a result of it, thereby saving countless lives across the land and the sea.
Afforestation
Trees produce oxygen that we breathe. So, planting more trees would result in more oxygen for us to breathe. But it’s not just about us, now is it? Plants, insects, and animals depend on trees for their survival.
Here’s a fun fact: a newly introduced law in the Philippines has made it compulsory for students to plant ten trees if they wish to graduate! And it is estimated that this would result in 525 billion trees being planted over the course of one generation! (Talk about a responsible education system…)
Could you imagine if every person in India alone planted just one tree in their lifetime. That itself would amount to over one billion, five hundred million trees. Having said this, why don’t we all add ‘plant a tree’ to our bucket lists?
Volunteering
With great damage done to the environment, comes great responsibility to atone for our actions. Volunteering is a good way to help contribute to the greater cause of environmental restoration. This can be done through the smallest of actions like picking up bits of trash littered around trees. As a bonus, doing this with like minded people in the neighbourhood can make the activity all the more fun!
(But please don’t do this for the sake of uploading photos on social media.)
Don’t waste food
The food we waste from our plates causes a lot of problems for the environment for two primary reasons: 1) Large volumes of water are required as part of agricultural practice to procure different foods. Wasted food thus results in much of this water going to waste. 2) Food waste is usually disposed of in landfills, which ends up producing harmful gasses in abundance, some of which include methane, carbon di-oxide, and chlorofluorocarbons.
It thus goes without saying that you should eat all that’s on your plate, not just out of sympathy for lesser privileged humans, but also for the planet that suffers as a result of the decisions made on the dining table.
Teach your children
It would mean much to bring changes into our lifestyle if we can’t pass them down to the future generations that will come after us. Completely restoring nature won’t be possible in a single generation, and will require the collective efforts of many generations to follow. By passing on good lessons of reciprocity towards the environment, we can make sure that nature is in safe hands with a future that will look green.
There is still time to change things. Let’s get to work and do our bit to give back to nature.