Recycling: The Easiest Way to Do Your Bit for the Planet

Wrong, wrong, WRONG! Households in the UK produced 30.5 million tonnes of waste in 2003-4, while only 17% was recycled. In some European countries, over 50% of all waste is recycled. Recycling is a great way to save energy and the environment as it just reuses what material we have already dug up and just puts it into different use; for instance old bits of plastic could be made into bottles or milk cartons.

Recycling has been used since the world wars where scrap metal and wood were recycled in order to build planes and tanks. They also reused alot of food that was left over to make sure that all surplus food not eaten was not wasted. This all meant that less money had to be spent digging raw materials out of the ground or using more fertiliser to plant more plants and instead used in the war effort (which we won in the end!).

Nowadays, recycling can be seen in so many ways and forms. Even large companies and heavy industry have taken up recycling. In the manufacture of Aluminium, old Aluminium scraps are thrown in to the furnace, because it costs a fraction of what it would cost to dig up the same weight out of the ground. This isn't just good business sense, it is recycling! Big businesses now want green credentials, because they feel that public opinion is with being green. Today they recycle old paper, pens, laptops, mobile phones, anything you can think of. Innocent drink bottles are made out of 100% recycled plastic! Big supermarkets are now charging money to use plastic bags, because they feel that plastic, which takes (1000 years to break down) is just not worth it to the environment. The scheme is working with less people using plastic bags, which means lest cost to the company's coffers in terms of buying plastic bags and a boost to their green credentials. It's not just good business sense, its recycling!

If people's problem against recycling is the mere gravity of having to sort out their plastic bottles from their cardboard boxes, it is not that hard! There are many recycling banks that collect goods that can be recycled. There are even some in major shopping chains, which can make life easier for you to be able to recycle as you can buy your shopping and help the environment.

My council has supplied boxes to have recycled goods in and every Tuesday they take it away. You don't even have to sort it and everything goes in there from newspapers to plastic milk bottles. If you don't have one in your constituency get your MP to do something about it.

Finally the belief that food cannot be recycled is a myth. The food that you so carelessly throw away can actually help you and your garden. The bacteria and microbes break down food into minerals and nutrients that plants can take up and help them grow as natural fertiliser. This is called compost - which is usually associated with rotting tree logs or plants - is anything that has rotted and turned into soil. If you don't like the idea of rotting food being in your backgarden and the smell coming through your windows, get one of the great solutions that encase the food and break it down into the soil directly, so you don't even have to move it around. One great solution (of which I own) is the Greencone, which does exactly what I have just said. You don't have to buy one, but if you own a garden you must undrestand how beneficial you food could be to your plants and how much lower fertiliser and artificial compost expenses could be.

Recycling isn't hard and is one of the many things that us as a local community can do to help the environment and try to stop global warming by reusing our natural materials, which will save energy and money. As I have said a few times throughout this article: it's not just good business sense, it is recycling!