Plastic Free July ended, for us, with a whimper rather than a satisfying bang as the family headed off to the Southeast of Ireland for 10 days of camping. Suddenly all the changes we had made were overwhelming for us to keep up. Gone were the cloth nappies and washable wipes, cheese and snacks were again purchased in plastic and we found ourselves in possession of a few plastic bottles. However, while on our holidays, we continued to talk to people about our effort this month, which to us, feels nearly more productive than attempting to perfectly execute zero plastic consumption ourselves. Collecting collaborators in our effort is essential, and the process is futile without finding like minded people to join us.
To summarize our learnings, we found the greatest reduction in plastic use by going to cloth nappies (and potty training), using washable wipes, shopping at the local Farmer’s Markets using our own containers to buy produce and fish, shopping at Super Valu over other major chains for items we couldn’t find at the Farmer’s Market, and sourcing bulk beans, lentils and noodles at the English Market. This month also gave us the opportunity to try making some of our favourite snacks that came heavily packaged, such as yogurt, crackers, breadsticks and granola. Our biggest challenge was in finding dried fruit and nuts without lots of packaging (which we still haven’t done…)
So we made it to the end of plastic free July. Putting ourselves through this process has been a superb education about an issue that deserves some attention and that we can help with by changing some simple habits. We would certainly say that it was harder than we both expected…having had to forego many foods during July that we would just rather not live without, it will be nice to go back to those.
The thing is though that its hard to ignore the prevalence of plastic in our lives now that we have forced ourselves to pay attention. So thankfully our new perspective will mean that we plan to avoid a lot more that can be easily avoided, while continuing to look for sources of those things that eluded us during July. We’ve even considered whether or not there would yet be a strong enough demand in Ireland (yet) for unpackaged foods to justify bulk foods stores. Would such as business survive here yet? From our online searches, it seems that it won’t be long before these begin to appear in Ireland, as more and more people are becoming aware of waste issues and that in the case of plastics, recycling isn’t a solution.
Bring on Zero Waste Week in September! But until then, we’ll be discussing other things!
