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| Take Responsibility for your Actions and Their Effect on Self and Others. |
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| Did You Know? |
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| [open] Does Your Food Travel More than You Do? |
| When we shop at the grocery store today, we don't bat an eye at the sight of strawberries in the winter or perfect tomatoes from Holland. In the space of a generation, we've become accustomed to eating food that's never grown roots in local soil. In fact, most produce grown in the United States travels an average of 1,500 miles before it gets sold.
Trucking, shipping and flying in food from around the country and the globe takes a toll on the environment and on public health. Take grapes, for example. Every year, nearly 270 million pounds of grapes arrive in California, most of them shipped from Chile to the Port of Los Angeles. Their 5,900 mile journey in cargo ships and trucks releases 7,000 tons of global warming pollution each year, and enough air pollution to cause dozens of asthma attacks and hundreds of missed school days in California.
The way we eat has an enormous impact on the health of the planet. By choosing to eat lower on the food chain, and focusing on local and organic produce, we can curb global warming and air pollution, avoid toxic pesticides, support local farmers and enjoy fresh, tasty food.
Related Fact Sheets
Miles to California: How Far Has Your Food Traveled? |
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| [open] Local Food |
Did you know that the average meal travels 1200 miles to get to your plate? Emissions from the transportation of our food can be a large component of our carbon footprints.
You and your students can shrink your carbon footprints by eating locally grown food whenever possible. Try taking your students on a field trip to a local farm or farmers' market, or challenge your students to eat only local food for a day. Find a searchable directory of farm, markets and“Local Harvest.”
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| [open] Plastic Water Bottles |
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80% of the 25 billion single-serving plastic water bottles Americans use each year, end up in landfills. Recycle your bottles, or better yet, choose to reuse with a refillable water bottle made of refill safe material.
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| [open] Responsible Purchasing |
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Buying new products made from recycled materials allows you to “close the loop.” Thus, creating a market for the recycled material items either recycled from your curbside or through other recycling pro
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| [open] Water Conservation |
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Did you know the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency estimates that hotels use more than 180 billion gallons of water each year? That’s enough for more than 200 glasses of water – for every person in the world!
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| [open] Plastic Bags |
Data released by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency shows that somewhere between 500 billion and a trillion plastic bags are consumed worldwide each year. - National Geographic News, September 2, 2003.
Less than 1% of bags are recycled. It cost more to recycle a bag than to produce a new one.
“There’s harsh economics behind bag recycling: It costs $4,000 to process and recycle 1 ton of plastic bags, which can then be sold on the commodities market for $32.” - Jared Blumenfield, Director of San Francisco’s Department of the Environment
Then…Where Do They Go?
A study in 1975 showed oceangoing vessels together dumped 8 million pounds of plastic annually. The real reason that the world’s landfills weren’t overflowing with plastic was because most of it ended up in an ocean-fill. - U.S. National Academy of Sciences.
Plastic bags can be seen blowing in the wind, floating in our seas, lakes and rivers. Bags find their way into the sea via drains and sewage pipes. They have been found floating north of the Arctic Circle near Spitzbergen, and as far south as the Falkland Islands. – British Antarctic Survey
Plastic bags account for over 10 percent of the debris washed up on the U.S. coastline. – National Marine Debris Monitoring Program
Plastic bags photodegrade: over time they break down into smaller, more toxic petro-polymers. Which eventually contaminate soils and waterways. As a consequence microscopic particles can enter the food chain. - CNN.com/technology November 16, 2007
The effect on wildlife can be catastrophic. Birds become terminally entangled. Nearly 200 different species of sea life including whales, dolphins, seals and turtles die due to plastic bags. They die after ingesting plastic bags which they mistake for food. – World Wildlife Fund Report, 2005
So…What Can We Do?
If you use a cloth bag we can save 6 bags a week, that’s 24 bags a month, 288 bags a year, 22,176 bags in an average life time.
If just 1 out of 5 people in our country did this we would save 1,330,560,000,000 bags over our life-time.
Bangladesh has banned plastic bags. - MSNBC.com March 8, 2007
China has banned free plastic bags. – CNN.com/asia January 9, 2008
Ireland took the lead in Europe, taxing plastic bags in 2002 and have now reduced plastic bag consumption by 90%. – BBC News August 20, 2002
In 2005 Rwanda banned plastic bags. – Associated Press
Israel, Canada, Western India, Botswana, Kenya, Tanzania, South Africa, Taiwan and Singapore have also banned or are moving toward banning plastic bags. – PlanetSave,com February 16, 2008
On March 27, 2007, San Francisco becomes the first city to ban plastic bags. – NPR.org (National Public Radio)
Oakland and Boston are considering ban. – The Boston Globe, May 20, 2007
Plastic shopping bags are made from polyethylene: a thermoplastic made from oil. CNN.com/technology November 16, 2007
Reducing plastic bags will decrease foreign oil dependency.
China will save 37 million barrels of oil each year due to their ban of free plastic bags. – CNN.com/asia January 9, 2008
It is Possible…
Do something drastic…Cut the plastic.
Say no to Plastic Bags
Help you community become a plastic bag free city!!! |
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