Zero waste on the go - Guest blog from #WasteNothing Challenge

In April this year, Bristol Waste Company launched the Bristol #WasteNothing Challenge. 

Fifty households, of all shapes and sizes, from across Bristol have signed up to try and reduce their waste and recycling down to zero over the course of a year. Through their activities we have been finding out all sorts of interesting ways to avoid creating waste. 

Having a few lightweight bits of kit in your bag ready for whenever you leave the house could make a huge difference to the amount of rubbish you create when you’re on-the-go. Here are some of our top tips for reducing waste away from home. 

Be Tupp-aware 

Are you going somewhere there might be food? Having a clean container, like an old ice cream tub, with you means that you can swoop in and save any tasty leftovers to eat later. Some shops and take-aways will also let you use your own containers. 

The last straw 

Having a reusable straw in your bag means you can whip it out when ordering a drink to make sure they know you don’t want a plastic straw ending up in your glass. 

Refill, not landfill 

Taking a refillable water bottle with you will save you from buying drinks in single-use packaging. Loads of places will let you refill your bottle for free, and you can download an app that shows you where here. 

Pack your bag 

Take a backpack, take a reusable shopping bag and produce bags or simply re-use existing ones. 

Be a snack detective 

If you are buying food and drinks on the go, try to either buy things without any packaging or check out what packaging it comes in to see if it can be recycled. Or alternatively, plan ahead.

Comments from Mya-Rose Craig AKA Birdgirl

At our camps, we try to ensure that we have virtually nothing to throw away. Atendees bring drinks bottles, all our plates and cups are reuseable and we have no straws or baby wipes.

Ensuring that the children and volunteers who attend our camps learn about nature conservation and environmental issues through our discussions.

Discussing how our camp being vegetarian benefits the planet, why litter is bad for the environment and wildlife and why we are aiming to make our camps zero waste. Often when they arrive, they think nothing of chucking litter on the floor which we have to discuss with them. Having recyling boxes close by helps.

Total waste from Camp Chew March 2019

Copyright Mya-Rose Birdgirl Craig

About the Author

 Young environmentalist and birder Mya-Rose Birdgirl Craig

Copyright Mya-Rose Birdgirl Craig 

Mya-Rose Craig is a 17-year-old young British Bangladeshi birder, naturalist, conservationist, environmentalist, activist, writer and speaker. She is based near Bristol and writes posts about birding, conservation and environmental issues from around the world. 

She has been involved in the UK organisation of the Youth Strikes encouraging young people from around the world to not go to school once a month and protest instead demanding immediate action to prevent climate breakdown. This is an interview in New Statesman.

She was a Bristol European Green Capital Ambassador along with Kevin McCloud, Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, Tony Juniper, Simon King, Miranda Krestovnikoff and Shaun the Sheep! See the full list of Bristol Ambassadors. She has also been listed with the singer-songwriter George Ezra and actress Maisie Williams from Game of Thrones as one of Bristol's most influential young people. 

She organised four nature is helping to run four more in 2019. She also organised a conference, Race Equality in Nature, in June 2016 aiming to increase the ethnic diversity in nature and plans two more in 2019. She has also set up Black2Nature with the aim of working with organisations to increase the access to nature of Visible Minority Ethnic people and is President. Please connect with her on LinkedIn (Mya-Rose Birdgirl Craig) so that she can invite you to join the Race Equality in Nature LinkedIn Group and be part of the change. 

She has given over 50 talks, speaking at conferences such as being on a panel with George Monbiot and Caroline Lucas on Sustainability and the Future of Cities. She is a Minister in Chris Packham's Manifesto for Nature in 2018 and spoke in front of 10,000 people at the Walk for Nature. She has also appeared on TV and radio and is particularly proud of being in Silent Roars, a short film which was part of Listen to Britain 2017 https://player.bfi.org.uk/free/film/watch-the-silent-roars-2017-online. 

She has been awarded the Bath and West Show Environmental Youth Award 2017 for Bristol for her Black2Nature work EYA 2017. She was also listed as one of Bristol's BME top 100 powerlist.

She loved seeing Mountain Gorillas in East Africa and Penguins in Antarctica over Christmas 2015, her 7th continent. She became the youngest person to see 5000 birds in 2019 age 16 and is looking forward to visiting Brazil birding in 2019 and hopes to see half the birds in the world there. Please also like her Birdgirl Facebook Page and follow her on Birdgirl Twitter. If you would like to contact Mya-Rose about her work, please e-mail helenabcraig@hotmail.co.uk.