The best way to reduce rubbish is to not produce it in the first place. There is a lot of power in your consumer choices. If you don’t buy things that will end up as waste, producers will make less of it. This way a lot of energy and resources can be saved and a lot of rubbish avoided.

Think before you buy and don’t buy things that you don’t really need.

Buy loose vegetables in bags rather than pre-packed in plastic trays.

Boycott products with excessive packaging, e.g. individually wrapped sanitary pads.

Don’t use disposable things.

Put an end to junk mail by visiting www.mpsonline.org.uk and request to be taken of the address list. Put up a “no junk mail please” note on your post box to avoid un-addressed junk.

Buy good quality clothes, furniture, and electrical appliances. If you look after them well they will last a long time and save you having to dispose of and replace them.

When things do break, see if they can be repaired instead of replaced.

Reuse

Using things many times also saves new things being produced and old things going to the tip. You probably reuse things all the time without thinking of it as an “act of environmentalism”. That’s excellent, but if with a little thought there is probably still more you can do. Here are a few tips.

Get a “bag for life” to take to the shop. Or just bring a rucksack or old plastic bag.

Plastic carriers can also be used instead of buying bin liners. When you have reduced, reuse and recycled a bin liner would be too big for your little pile of rubbish anyway.

Old food containers can have many lives. Take-away boxes are great for bringing lunch, jam jars to keep tea and coffee in etc.

Arrange clothes, toys and book swapping days.

Donate clothes, books, furniture, mobile phones etc to charity.

Consider using your local milkman, re-usable glass bottles saves a lot of waste and energy.

When possible, buy refills for your old containers.

Recycle

Can’t reduce it, can’t reuse it? Then recycle it. Recycling means processing old goods and making new things from the material. A can might become part of a car, a plastic bottle can be made into fleece fabric or a newspaper turned into insulation material. Paper, glass, cardboard, tins, cans and plastic bottles can usually be recycled locally. More and more households are served by kerbside recycling schemes. If you are not, you can take your things to the nearest communal recycling point.

For information about recycling in your local area, see the following links.

Recycling in West Sussex

Recycling in East Sussex

One great way of recycling is composting. 20% of the average bin is filled with organic materials. This can be composted in your back garden and give high quality, completely free fertiliser and compost. For more information about composting visit The Composting Association. Many councils also have schemes that sells compost bins at a reduced rates, check with your local authority.

Don’t forget that for the recycle processes to work we must also buy products made from recycled materials. Click here to search for products and stockists or check out this recycled products list.