REDUCE means reducing the amount of waste you produce by buying more responsibly and managing your resources more reasonably. Responsible shopping consists first of all in spending your money wisely and avoiding buying products that are not necessary or with useless packaging. A responsible consumer reduces expenses, produces less waste, buys local products, and as a result, contributes to the reduction of C02 emissions caused by transport and to the minimization of costs related to waste management.
Reducing your waste to zero is impossible, but you can often reuse it. This is why the second “R” of the 3R’s rule stands for “REUSE”, i.e. “use again”. REUSE is a recommendation to use and not to damage things that can have a second life.
A lot of the waste we produce contains valuable resources which can be recycled and reused. Most of it can be already recycled by sorting our home waste into glass, plastic or paper. Recycling resources is the best solution when you cannot reduce the amount of your waste or cannot find for it a new life.
Most of us know what recycling and sorting are about. We know what packages we throw away are made of, we are able to differentiate paper from glass, plastic and metal. We are also presumably able to tell if something can be recycled or not. But, do we know the meaning of symbols on packaging?
The recycling code consists of three chasing arrows, arranged clockwise and forming a triangle. The numerical code of the material is indicated inside the triangle and the abbreviated name of the material can be found just below. If a package or a product has such a symbol, it means that it is recyclable. The most frequently used symbols are listed below.
used on product packaging and determined by ordinance of the Minister of Environment on packaging symbols (Dz.U.2014 poz. 1298).