Thursday 5 April 2012

E for excess packaging


Don’t you just fume when you see over packaged items in the shops and in deliveries to your house? 

I certainly agonise about what we are doing to the environment in choosing this sort of solution to sell off food worth a few pennies/cents – use of cling film and polystyrene tray for a tiny bhajee. 

over packaged food
In the county I live in the council have worked out that an average county home throws out around 4.6kg of packaging such as shrink wrap, cardboard sleeves and plastic trays every week - equivalent to 575 plastic bags. The point is made that food needs packaging but it is the excess wrapping that is the problem. We have all seen shots of a single banana in a tray covered in film...and opened pass the parcel style deliveries.

I was disappointed to read that last year our government chose to stall on setting up tougher measures on packaging. This image accompanied the article in The Independent. 

What's your excess packaging horror story?                                                                                                                                                                         
Independent newspaper waste image



6 comments:

  1. Hi Susan,

    Great post. I guess the thing that gets me riled up is all the ads and fliers that come to my home via US mail. I do not want them in the first place, and I cringe to think of all the waste.

    One time when I was studying in France I went to the grocery store and was initially so impressed that everyone brought their own bag (this is more than 15 years ago). Then I noticed in the greeting card section that EVERY SINGLE card was wrapped in cellophane! Every card! First, it made it so you could not read the card and decide which one to buy (these were individual cards). And second, obviously the plastic would just be thrown away.

    Found your blog on the a to z, will definitely be back to read more!

    best,
    MOV

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  2. When I buy ink cartidges for my printer on-line, they arrive in a huge cardboard box, filled with polystyrene chips and bubble wrap. Terrible waste (and it bumps up the postage cost) plus it comes by courrier instead of ordinary mail!

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  3. I read that someone suggested standing at the checkout and unwrapping everything before you pay for it but that would only be unkind to the people in the queue behind you and the checkout worker and it's not their fault. Something should be done about it though!!

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  4. always find stores using too many bags. i try to remember to bring my own!

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  5. I am so huge on saving the environment and totally agree with this post. There is so much waste and disregard for the future. There are always solutions...

    Great post, I like how you think!

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  6. I'm not a fan of excess packaging, especially when it's really difficult to open. I can appreciate the need for packaging to a certain degree to protect the enclosed product, but am amazed by the amount of stuff that goes into my trash or recycling bin that is mere packaging.


    Lee
    An A to Z Co-Host
    Tossing It Out

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