Being green...........

Presentation link
Last week I added the link from my presentation to the previous post for those who never got to listen, click here.  

In follow up to that presentation, I wanted to expand on a couple of points that came up for discussion................

Recycling vs truly cyclic
While recycling is far better than doing nothing, it is not the answer.  What we should be doing is looking at how the waste can be designed out of the system.  So when looking for solutions to problems that create waste think about options that could be implemented that design waste out of the system. 

Bio/degradable plastic bags
With regards to my comment on these that I forgot to continue the discussion on, relating to biodegradable plastic bags, unfortunately they are basically a just another problem.

Unfortunately they appeal to people that are trying to improve the environment, but they in fact cause as much of a problem, if not more.  If you must choose to use plastic bags, it is far better to use plastic ones that are recyclable like the supermarket bags than biodegradable plastic bags.  As per a previous post, with the biodegradable bags,  they have simply  added a polymer to them that makes them weaker and break into small pieces when exposed to sunlight.  The small pieces then get into waterways and into the food chain.  They can't be recycled so can't go that way and they also are no good in landfill because it is dark - they just stay like any other plastic.  Of course the best option is something that was sourced from a sustainable source, is reusable many times and  then fully biodegradable at the end of its life - cotton, hemp and paper may fall into this category, but check out the origins of the bag first.  

The really disappointing thing is that people choose them becasue they genuinely think they are better and want to do the right thing and someone up the food chain is making a lot of money about of praying on this.

Challenge
Whenever you are in a shop that offers you a biodegradable plastic bag, decline it and take the time to educate them why you are declining.  If they hear it enough times, someone will feed that information up the chain.  

Food for thought
To end this blog, I got this email from a colleague the other day and it is so true, I thought it was worth sharing:

Being Green

Checking out at the store, the young cashier suggested to the older woman, that she should bring her own grocery bags because plastic bags weren't good for the environment.
The woman apologized and explained, "We didn't have this green thing back in my earlier days."

The young clerk responded, "That's our problem today. Your generation did not care enough to save our environment for future generations."

She was right -- our generation didn't have the green thing in its day.

Back then, we returned milk bottles, soda bottles and beer bottles to the store. The store sent them back to the plant to be washed and sterilized and refilled, so it could use the same bottles over and over. So they really were recycled.

But we didn't have the green thing back in our day.



Grocery stores bagged our groceries in brown paper bags, that we reused for numerous things, most memorable besides household garbage bags, was the use of brown paper bags as book covers for our schoolbooks. This was to ensure that public property, (the books provided for our use by the school) was not defaced by our scribblings. Then we were able to personalize our books on the brown paper bags.

But too bad we didn't do the green thing back then.

We walked up stairs, because we didn't have an escalator in every store and office building.

We walked to the grocery store and didn't climb into a 300-horsepower machine every time we had to go two blocks.

But she was right. We didn't have the green thing in our day.

Back then, we washed the baby's diapers because we didn't have the throwaway kind. We dried clothes on a line, not in an energy-gobbling machine burning up 220 volts -- wind and solar power really did dry our clothes back in our early days. Kids got hand-me-down clothes from their brothers or sisters, not always brand-new clothing.

But that young lady is right; we didn't have the green thing back in our day.

Back then, we had one TV, or radio, in the house -- not a TV in every room.. And the TV had a small screen the size of a handkerchief (remember them?), not a screen the size of the state of Montana . In the kitchen, we blended and stirred by hand because we didn't have electric machines to do everything for us. When we packaged a fragile item to send in the mail, we used wadded up old newspapers to cushion it, not Styrofoam or plastic bubble wrap.. 


Back then, we didn't fire up an engine and burn gasoline just to cut the lawn.. We used a push mower that ran on human power. We exercised by working so we didn't need to go to a health club to run on treadmills that operate on electricity.

But she's right; we didn't have the green thing back then.

We drank from a fountain when we were thirsty instead of using a cup or a plastic bottle every time we had a drink of water. We refilled writing pens with ink instead of buying a new pen, and we replaced the razor blades in a razor instead of throwing away the whole razor just because the blade got dull.

But we didn't have the green thing back then.

Back then, people took the streetcar or a bus and kids rode their bikes to school or walked instead of turning their moms into a 24-hour taxi service. We had one electrical outlet in a room, not an entire bank of sockets to power a dozen appliances. And we didn't need a computerized gadget to receive a signal beamed from satellites 23,000 miles out in space in order to find the nearest burger joint.

But isn't it sad the current generation laments how wasteful we old folks were just because we didn't have the green thing back then?

Food for thought isn't it...............

Kind Regards
Francesca

Invitation to a presentation on the Future of the Veterinary Profession

On Friday 3rd August at 12noon - 1pm  NZ time,  I will present: "Are we fit for the future?" to anyone interested in how the veterinary profession of the future might look and how we might get there from where we are now.


To attend you will need to be able to access this link: https://adobeconnect.op.ac.nz/futurefocus/  (if you are not an Otago Polytechnic employee/Student,  just enter as a guest).  


If your computer is functional for skype, you should have no problems entering, but I would recommend trying to access prior to Friday to ensure that any downloads you may need to do are completed in time.


I look forward to seeing you there.


Kind Regards
Francesca Matthews

For those people that didn't get to attend the recording can be viewed at: https://adobeconnect.op.ac.nz/p6uculq7wb4/ 

A challenge issued to you all....

Back after a break for a couple of weeks and this week the topic that has popped into my head is one I've perhaps done before but from a different angle.  

There are a variety of reasons why I decided on this topic this week but the primary reason would be the effect this link had on me.  I have seen links like this before.  There are plenty on the internet and they are not so nice, so be warned if you decide to open it.  I decided that the reality is you need to know how bad the plastic problem is and how essential it is that each and every one of us make changes to our relationship with plastic. 

Remember as consumers if we don't purchase it, there is no economic reason to use it as a packaging product. 

If you do read the link posted above, use it as a springboard to make changes - if you make a change and convince 10 friends to do the same and they tell 10 friends each, you can see very quickly that there is a momentum of change.

Plastic Bales - recycled plastic baled up and ready for transport to places like China for down-cycling into a lower grade plastic product (that may or may not be recyclable at the end of its life)

The CHALLENGE I issue to you:

As it is nigh on impossible to remove plastic completely from your lives when you look around, the challenge is to REDUCE the amount of plastic you purchase and use.  Where there is no other option, make sure that what plastic you do use has a REUSABLE function and can be RECYCLED at the end of its life.  At the end of its life make sure you DO in fact RECYCLE it.  

(Remember recycling on its own is not the answer because plastics degrade over time and the products that plastics are recycled into a generally lower grade plastics and eventually the plastic will end up in landfill, that is why we need to reduce our reliance on it first.  The ideal product is completely cyclic)

Here are some ideas to get you started.  Please add more ideas to the comments on the blog

1. Stop accepting plastic bags at retail outlets - take your own reusable bags.
2. Even when you purchase fruit and veges - put these in a reusable bag not the plastic bags supplied on reels.  Have a look at www.rethinknz.com for a great alternative.   
3. There is now a brand of unbleached toilet paper which is packaged in paper -  yes is produced and packaged in Aussie, but if we all change to it, pretty soon the New Zealand companies will do the same then we can change to locally produced too
4. For your pets, if you feed them a wet component to their diet,  don't purchase "Singles" for wet food.  Purchase the wet food in cans, because tin cans are easily recyclable
5. Purchase non-plastic food bowls for your pets and toys that are fully biodegradable or at least fully recyclable.  
6. Decide to stop using gladwrap (or other brands of clingfilm).  You can purchase high quality plastic containers that have a reuse life of many many years to store left overs in or for transporting lunches.  Look after these containers well and they will serve you for many years, then recycle them.  Alternatively look for containers made from glass or stainless that really will last a lifetime. 
7. Don't buy bottled water.  In New Zealand there is no need.  Refill your reusable drink bottle from a tap.  If its chlorinated and you don't like the taste, leave it in the fridge with the lid off for a few hours and the chlorine will go.  
8. Make sure all your discarded electronic equipment which is full of plastic as well as all sorts of precious metals is taken to the correct place for full recycling. 
9. Look for product alternatives that use less packaging and little or no plastic.  
10. Purchase your meat from a butcher and have it wrapped in butchers paper - ask them to forgo the plastic bag (this avoids not only the plastic wrap but the polystyrene too).
11. Ban lunch inorganic lunch waste from being disposed of at work.  This means people either need to take their waste home or they are encouraged to make a change.  Provide a bokashi bucket for the organic waste. 

I am quite sure you all have heaps more ideas - add them to the comments at the bottom of the blog.  

There are so many little change you can make that together make a big difference.  Remember to share your changes and why you are making them with friends  - use the power of social media to share the ideas or even this blog. 

People know they need to do something so if we give specific ideas of what these are, people will do it.

Have a great plastic reduced weekend!

Kind Regards
Francesca

Wild Yeast

Can't believe its the last week of term this week!!  

After a post I saw on Facebook last week on the Permaculture Canterbury Facebook page about making your own yeast, I thought given that many of us may be able to take a few days out over the next 2 weeks and try something creative at home that would be an appropriate post to end the week on. 

In terms of increasing sustainability, and reducing our footprint on this planet, doing things to reduce our reliance on the global food chain is a step in the right direction.  So the purpose of this post is really to show you that even some of the things you thought you couldn't source locally, you can!

http://ruralspin.com/2012/01/22/collecting-and-maintaining-wild-yeast-sourdough-starter/

For those wondering what this has to do with veterinary clinics, well why not take a bread maker in to work and have your own culture of yeast in the fridge to make bread from time to time (or bring a loaf in from home to share.   What a nice way to bond with your clinic work mates than share fresh bread for lunch, made with wild yeast, and spread with locally made chutneys and cheeses. 

Have fun and see if you can think of other ways to reduce your reliance on the global food chain. 

I'll going to take a couple of weeks break from this blog and I'll be back in the new term with new tips and ideas to help you start thinking differently!

Kind Regards
Francesca

PS Join our Facebook page: FuturefocusVet where we will try and centralise ideas around a future focused veterinary clinic.

Doggy Doo Disposal

Getting rid of Doggy Doo is a real problem for pet owners and for our profession.  Doggy Waste makes up a significant source of the waste stream to landfill.  One American website stated 4%.

Going to landfill is fraught will all sorts of issues including leachates from the plastics (including the so called biodegradeable ones) and the fact that the dog faeces  in the bags is not being broken down so the level of contamination will potentially increase over time.  In addition the methane and other greenhouse gas release from landfills.  At landfills, they try to prevent breakdown too as much as possible so there is also the situation that a waste product that is able to be broken down is being sent into a linear system.  Our goal needs to be zero waste to landfill, because landfill is an end point in a linear system and in order to be sustainable everything needs to be cyclic. 

Commercial composting (compost waste collected a kerbside) doesn't work because the system is too fast and they sell the compost which could end up on vegetable gardens and they don't want to risk (however small) people getting sick from doggy doo contaminants.  This is why doggy doo is specifically excluded from these bins. 

It is my opinion that individual pet owners and  members of the animal industry need to change the way they/we deal with doggy doo and encourage the councils providing doggy doo bins to do the same. 

Buried doggy doo in your garden will eventually be broken down by soil microbes but using the accelerated bokashi system described in the YouTube videos below speeds up the process.    This is a Canadian based system and I am investigating what is available here that is similar. 

There are many other links on YouTube that describe ways to compost doggy doo.  Remember to use your skills to pick the professional videos vs those that aren't and need to be verified by another source.  Some other videos suggest using septic tank bacterial systems for accelerating breakdown. 

This series of videos on YouTube is using a bokashi system based on the system from this website: http://www.bokashicycle.com/petcycle.html: 

Part 1:

Part 2:

Part 3:

Part 4:

Would it be economic for council to collect all faeces at kerbside (a doggy doo bin) look after it for its citizens or should the citizens take responsibility.  What about at dog parks - should the council provide a composting system at the gate and also encourage the used of scoops or paper to pick up waste not plastic. Who educates the citizens?  Our profession could play a big part here.  We are good at explaining about desexing, vaccinating etc but what about community service stuff like responsible doogy doo disposal. 

I am really interested in some discussion on this.  What are you doing?  Has anyone got some evidence based information on bacterial load of the waste after bokashi composting for example.   

I look forward to the discussions.

Kind Regards
Francesca

Know your neighbours

Image source

Did you know that an integral part of sustainability is getting active in your community!  This social side of sustainability is extremely important. 

For a workplace this includes getting to know and work with not only the businesses close by, but also the people that live in your area and are the bulk of the clients that come to you.

For example are you working in a veterinary clinic which sends it laundry away to be laundered?  Where is it going?  Are you supporting a local community business, that has good service and cares for the environment?  Where else are you sourcing things for your clinic - can they be sourced locally rather than from businesses/suppliers based far away.  I realise a number of things can't be but there will be some things, perhaps more than you think. 

Do you get involved with the local school - sponsoring events, offering up prizes, talking to the kids about animal care and responsibilities or about training to be a veterinarian, veterinary nurse or rural animal technician?  

Do you make your facilities available to community groups or offer special services to the local community?  

Singing "Neighbours, everybody needs good neighbours, with a little understanding, neighbours become good friends"

At home - do you know your neighbours? 

Neighbours are "alarms" when you are out, they can share things with you (perhaps you grow great tomatoes and always have too many and they grow great apples and always have too many), perhaps you have an elderly neighbour who would be happy for you to plant a vege garden at their place provided you share some of the produce?  Neighbours can help you if you need help and vice versa.  Perhaps one neighbour is a builder, another is a plumber, another a gourmet cook that does catering and you have a hobby of restoring old furniture to their former glory!  Perhaps you can all share services for a win win situation without so many $$$ changing hands?   

In an ideal world we should be pulling our fences down that separate us rather than building them up to facilitate these neighbourly interactions. 

In Norway this is one thing that really struck me about the communities - they are not all fenced in.  It is very similar in Tekapo, in the MacKenzie Basin.  There is a council bylaw that prevents high fences separating properties.   I think removing the fences has the effect of opening everyone up so its easier to say hello and chat.  Making this easier would reduce the feelings of loneliness people experience.  Social interaction is important for keeping people healthy.  

Modern NZ homes where households enter the car from an internal access garage, drive off somewhere and then return to the internal access garage make it very hard to create interaction with your neighbours.  Choose to walk to local places, make an effort to knock on the neighbours door and say hi.  Maybe take some of you home baking over.  

I am not saying we should live in communes but we should create communities that are open and welcoming.  In addition to this we should be open and welcoming ourselves - hold street parties, invite your neighbours for a coffee to build relationships or drop them over so excess produce you have and stay for a chat.  You never know what doors might open to you.    

A personal story

On a personal side, I wanted to share the situation I live in with our neighbours to show that I recognise that some neighbours are impossible to like and get to know.  

We live up a long drive in a caldersac,  All the neighbours in this drive and up the street get on, know each other enough for a chat, to look out for my kids who play up and down the street.  Our immediate neighbours up our drive are often sharing plants and produce with us.  However the house that shares our longest boundary, but is entered from a different street contains a set of neighbours I wish we didn't have and we have had to go against my own advice above and put a trellis top on the fence to stop them looking over the fence when they yell at the kids for playing outside (which occasionally involves squealing), for us having BBQs on the patio or any similar normal neighbourhood activity.  They won't talk to us, they won't accept offers of a coffee etc so we've given up!  If anyone would like to make an offer on that house so that we can take the trellis down and even put a gate in the fence I'll be happy to present the offer to them!! LOL

This weeks challenge

Make an effort to meet and greet at least one neighbour that you don't know. 

If you know all your neighbours already you can rest on that one and take a big pat on the back and perhaps you might like instead to share your secrets of how you have got to know all your neighbours on this blog. 

Have a great weekend

Kind Regards
Francesca

Product stewardship

This weeks blog we look at taking a personal responsbility for everything that passes through your hands, rather than thinking someone else will sort the problem.  This is known as product stewardship. 

The best way to explain this concept is by sharing some examples: 

1. That bottle of what you purchase instead of refilling a bottle from a  tap.  Think about:

• Where it came from - both the bottle and the water? 
• What is the end of life for that bottle, even if I put it in the right bin (for example - these bottles are usually downcycled, so recycling occurs but into products of lower and lower quality as the chemical bonds break over time before eventually ending in landfill)?
• Do I really need to buy it?
• If I do buy it how am I going to make sure that bottle gets reused as much as possible and then placed in the correct receptacle for recycling?

2. The old TV that you now want to replace with a  flat panel: 

Do we really need to replace it - nearly all older TVs can get digital with with purchase of a digital aerial.  Much money and resources can be saved by sticking with your older TV

• If you have an old unused working TV before you take it for disposal, consider whether it might be useful to someone else to use. 
• If you do have an old TV to dispose of, these can be recycled - take responsibility for taking it to a recycling facility that can deal with it.
• There is often a charge for this service - pay the small charge (up to around $20), rather than dumping it in landfill and it leaching toxic chemicals that will affect the future of our children and grandchildren.  This is part of product stewardship

3.  The way you drive

We nearly all own cars, fill them with petrol and drive.  As well as selection of car model, part of product stewardship with these is making sure we care for them well to maximise their life and fuel efficiency and drive efficiently to maximise the number of kilometres we get out of the tank of fuel.  

This includes:

• maintenance of tyre pressure
• regular servicing
• smooth driving and keeping speed lower especially on the open road. 
• avoiding short trips if possible.  

You should ask questions about every product that is going to pass through your hands and make sure that when you decide to allow it into your hands that you now have a responsibility that when it is time to leave your hands that every though is going to where it will end up and making sure you choose the best option.