We need to only look at what has happened in Japan recently to realise that what we own and use is important when some people have lost everything.

Countries such as the USA have the highest consumption rates in the world per person. My sister lives in Virginia and I am from the UK and I could not believe the lifestyle that they led although I do agree that my sister is a small sample of American consumption.

After waking up in the morning they used to leave the tap running while cleaning their teeth which wasted lots of water. For breakfast, lunch and dinner they used to use disposable plates to avoid washing up and often had take away food due to time pressures. Take aways often come in throw away containers and frozen food is just as bad with five times more packaging than food.

For clearing surfaces they used disposable tissues and cleaning products instead of having a filthy reusable rag like I do but my bins take longer to fill for sure. Organic and eco friendly cleaning products should be used when possible although I did try soapods for washing clothes which did not work out that well.

Any food they did cook themselves had more packaging then I have ever seen in my life which adds to waste dumps in the local county.They used to ofte n buy cheaper disposable clothes that often didn\’t last long in the wash instead of investing in more expensive items that lasted longer.

Being interested in green companies and brands I had to explain to them that the more we consume the more of the worlds finite resources are being used up. From the paper towels, disposable plates and packaging comes tress which are being cut at unprecedented rates around the world and are not replenished unless they have the appropriate forest certification which cheap products never have.

Once these items are put in the bin, it needs to be collected and moved often greater distances to rubbish dumps where it is either buried or burnt and released into the atmosphere. There is also a problem with landfills getting full and all that lovely green land being lost as a result as we need more and more to satisfy our demands.

We need to start to think more about our actions and what we use, how we use it and why we use it? Do we really need to buy the big, multi packs of food unless we have a huge family to feed? Sometimes our eyes are bigger than our belly and we just buy,buy,buy.

Hundreds of millions of pounds of food are wasted each year and thrown from the fridge into the bin as it has gone off and not been used. You need to think of those people poorer than you that suffer from food poverty and cannot afford 3 meals a day.

Come on people wise up and think of others in this decade long recession we are suffering from when people think of money and survival and not the environment and future generations!

Author Bio: Are you looking for green companies that sell local food with little packaging if so guidemegreen has the answer.Our sister company Bricks and Pieces can help you by showing you the green alternative when shellbuilding. So for help with building drawings or planning permission for going green check us out!

Category: Society
Keywords: food,miles,air,supermarket,peoples,cheap,waste,recession,poverty,packaging,landfill,disposable,meals