By Eco-Rep Maddy Beucler (Class of 2024)
Plastic Free July provides resources and ideas to help you (and millions of others around the world) produce less single-use plastic waste everyday at home, work, school, and even at your local cafe.
What is the Pledge?
Plastic Free July is a key initiative of the Plastic Free Foundation that allows us to work towards our vision of seeing a world free of plastic waste. From humble beginnings in 2011, the award-winning Plastic Free July campaign is the result of years of hard work.
It was started by Rebecca Prince-Ruiz (the founder of the Plastic Free Foundation) and a small team in local government in Western Australia, and is now one of the most influential environmental campaigns in the world. Millions of people across the globe take part every year, with many committing to reducing plastic pollution far beyond the month of July.
What am I doing?
For my pledge, I am completely giving up single-use plastics, including the following:
-Plastic food and drink containers
-Plastic silverware and plates
-Plastic takeout bags
-Produce bags
As well as not buying the following items for the entire month of July:
-Clothing/accessories
-Makeup/toiletries in plastic packaging
-Plastic wrapped food (unless no alternative can be found)
How am I documenting my pledge?
Every week I will be making updates on how the challenge is going, and if I did buy or use any plastic. This isn’t to shame anyone!! Plastics are deeply ingrained in our lifestyles and it’s hard to go cold-turkey and completely give them up.
Whatever plastic products I do use, I will be saving it to show at the end of the month to see just how much can build up over a month-long period.
If you are interested in signing the pledge, visit plasticfreejuly.org.
And remember, make the pledge your own. Any plastic you give up is a giant step forward!
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