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The path to being eco-friendly: 5 habits that will improve our lives
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What are 5 simple steps to save the planet and lead us to naturalness?
In a world of abundance, where excessive consumption rules the ball, it is necessary to become more rational and be more environmentally friendly. A step towards awareness will not only allow you to manage your finances more wisely, but also come to an eco-friendliness, significantly improving not only your life, but also the lives of future generations.
By the beginning of last year, Russia had accumulated 38 billion 73 million tons of industrial and domestic waste. Every Russian has an average of 400 kg of garbage per year, while only 4-5% of the total is recycled for reuse. Awesome numbers?
From year to year, they will become more and more disappointing. But each of us can change the world for the better right now: for example, sort the garbage. The best option is four containers: for clean recyclable plastic, for unsorted waste, for waste paper, for glass and aluminum.
Paper cups, candy wrappers, glossy wrapping paper with glitter, paper or cardboard soaked in food or liquid, napkins, cashier’s checks, vegetable oil bottles cannot be recyclable. The less of this household waste you have in your home, the easier it is to sort the waste and the better for the environment.
The first plastic bag appeared in the USA in 1957 and … still hasn’t decomposed. The decomposition time of plastic bags in the ground is from 100 to 500 years. Packages that did not end up in a landfill and were not recycled are carried by the wind to forests, deserts, rivers, and from there to lakes, seas and oceans.
Two statistical facts that should change the way you think about plastic bags:
· The oceans end up with 8 million tons of plastic every year.
· There are whole garbage islands in the ocean: in the Pacific, for example, there is a garbage island the size of … France.
In many hypermarkets, plastic bags have become paid, and this is another reason to abandon them: buy reusable bags made from natural materials. Many of them are marked “eco-bag”. For heavy items, choose bags made from jute, canvas and other dense materials; for the lungs, ordinary cotton bags are suitable.
Switch to thermo mugs and reusable bottles
Disposable cups in coffee shops and fast food outlets increase the amount of non-recyclable waste. Switch to thermo mugs and reusable special sports bottles made of thermoplastic to save money on your daily drink purchases.
Many cafes began to provide small discounts for the use of personal containers when buying coffee with them. In addition, you can get your own glass bottle – it is heavier than the usual container, but much more environmentally friendly (glass is completely recyclable) and safer, including for your health.
This is not only environmentally friendly, but also contributes to good health, leads to a healthier body and longevity. We are so accustomed to foods with additives, flavors and dyes that we did not notice the destructive consequences of such long-term nutrition: and these include, for example, an increase in the number of allergy sufferers, an increase in genetic diseases.
Natural products are products that have been minimally processed and do not contain artificial colors and flavor enhancers. Such products, as a rule, are more expensive: the technology of their cultivation is more laborious, but saving on your health should be the last thing.
In supermarkets, look out for farm produce shelves and be sure to read food labels. Sugar, artificial preservatives, flavor enhancers, and the water-retaining agent propylene glycol E1520 should be the stop signals. And natural preservatives and additives, on the contrary, are the green light for buying: they include citric acid, malic acid, table salt, apple pectin, vitamins (for example, vitamins C and E are labeled E300 and E306 — E309).
If it is easy to give up sausages and sausages, in which there is clearly nothing useful, then it is not at all so easy to constantly limit yourself to sweet and tasty. However, both desserts and additives to main meals (for example, sauces and mayonnaise) must be natural, without sugar and artificial ingredients. And it is possible!
Choose whose products correspond to the eco-friendly style. Low-calorie sauces, mayonnaises, dessert creams, syrups and jams with all-natural formulations do not contain artificial colors and preservatives, gluten, GMOs and sugar – all this makes them available to everyone who looks after their health, and even for people with diabetes. Besides, equal to or less than the cost usually paid for non-natural products.
Read the compositions of household chemicals and cosmetics
Take a closer look at the labels on the cleaning products: if they are labeled “phosphate-free” or “biodegradable,” then you are moving in the right eco-direction. Products that do not contain chlorine, phosphates and other substances harmful to the environment are much safer for you: you must admit that it is unpleasant to inhale vapors of caustic chemicals.
Shampoos and shower gels can also contain hazardous ingredients. Check the cans for SLS and SLES – these surfactants enter water bodies with wastewater and can negatively affect the quality of drinking water.
In addition, with constant use, household chemicals and cosmetic products with environmentally unsafe ingredients negatively affect the skin, contributing to its dryness and leading to a decrease in the normal lipid barrier.
These five steps are just the beginning towards a sustainable lifestyle. Remember that the safer the products are for the environment, the more beneficial they are for your health, and how we relate to the world determines the quality of life of our children and grandchildren.