Reduce, reuse and recycle
Recycling Week
25 September - 1 October 2017
This year Recycle Week takes place from 25 September to 1 October 2017. The theme for the week is ‘Recycling – It’s Worth It!’
This special week has been held since 2004 and its mission has been to encourage us to recycle more. As we all know, recycling is very important for the environment and we need to reduce, reuse and recycle.
Many of us do this already, but Recycle Week is about taking it one step further! You may recycle at home, but do you recycle at work? Do you recycle glass jars as well as glass bottles? What do you do with used batteries and aerosol cans? Do your kids recycle at school? Recycling for kids can be fun, and these are just a few ideas for steps you can take to recycle even more!
In previous years Recycle Now has worked in partnership with Keep Britain Tidy. The Keep Britain Tidy campaign has been going for more that 50 years and their aim is to inspire people to take action to tackle litter and over 20 councils in the UK were inspired to sign up and test out new recycling schemes!
Every year I make a New Year resolution to be greener. It started by taking my own bags to the supermarket, and as I live in Scotland we have been charged 5p for every bag we use for a few years now – So I’m really pleased that I was an early adopter and got into the habit of doing this. It’s absolutely amazing what a 5p charge can do – shoppers who used to have loads of plastic carrier bags in their shopping trollies now reuse their bags! I was in Madeira recently and they also charge for plastic carrier bags in their supermarkets!! And, did you hear the recent news report about Kenya? They have banned plastic carrier bags and anyone found selling, manufacturing or carrying them could face fines of up to $38,000 or prison sentences of up to four years!
For more information about how you can get involved, visit the Recycle Week website. There’s also a great ideas guide which will help you decide how you can take part and make an impression during the week. I’m certainly going to take a look and see what I can do to reduce my carbon footprint.