Picture a regular day. It is after dinner, and you have some leftovers and their boxes in your hands. You dump them all in the trash and go about doing the other things in your routine.
Did that little snippet remind you of an average day in your life? If the answer is yes, could you spot an error that might seem negligible but is gravely problematic?
You use plenty of things every day and dispose of them in the most default way possible without realizing it. How many times do you take the time and effort to separate the different types of waste?
If you feel embarrassed about saying the answer out loud, you know you need to do more.
Why is responsible disposal necessary?
Believe it or not, studies show that the number of conscious and responsible consumers in today’s demographic is staggeringly low. And this has been the persistent case for a long time now. No wonder mother earth is on the edge of a precipice!
You are going to have to change these mechanisms sooner rather than later. And unlike popular beliefs, you won’t need to make the hell freeze over. By bringing this handful of ideas into practice, you will fulfil your part as a responsible inhibitor of mother nature.
But it is unlikely for you to incorporate these methods into your life all of a sudden. You need a motivator or a more concrete purpose. Meaning, for you to become a responsible citizen, you first need to realise why that need exists.
Its impact on personal hygiene, health and sanitation
It may or may not have struck you immediately, but personal hygiene, health, and sanitation are at the top priority.
Try thinking about it in the opposite direction for a more vivid picture. What if the space around you were filled with heaps of filthy clothes, half-eaten food, and things like that? You would get disgusted sooner or later and fix the mess.
In another case, your festering waste lying around would make a great home for bacteria and mould to breed in. So, unless a smart way of disposing of household waste is sought, you would be breathing infected air.
Not only can ill-hygiene cause rashes or allergies, but it could also lead to severe skin and body diseases.
Its impact on community health
Before people thought of disposing of household waste rightly, they resorted to landfills and such practices. Sure, it affected nature, but the impact eventually caught up to them as well.
Thousands of people complained of respiratory problems. Right from asthma and emphysema, to other systemic diseases, landfills caused a wave of problematic issues.
Hygiene which was unattended on a personal level and was generic in communities grew significantly in its magnitude. It was only a matter of time before falling sick collectively became a thing.
Its impact on the environment
You have covered the safety concerns arising on the personal and societal level so far. But now it is time to turn to the environment and examine it. Not only is rightly disposing of household waste a responsibility towards the future of mankind but also the environment.
Without proper and systematic waste management, the earth will continue to suffer and pay the cost of our actions. Be it untreatable plastic or water, your home in the sense of this planet will get hampered.
Besides, a lot of organisations and institutions have started to speak up about the concerns of climate change. If you do not take up the responsibility of doing your small part, the bigger actions will never succeed fully.
Just like charity begins at home, so does smartly disposing of household waste. So, without wasting another breath, push up your thumbs to read about the smartest ways of disposing of household waste!
How can you contribute to smartly disposing of household waste?
Before you get into the nitty-gritty of properly disposing of household waste, you need to keep one thing in mind. Never put off these practices and activities until the very end. Get done with them in that instance, so your work does not seem piled up!
Basic composting of kitchen waste
Composting your kitchen waste is not half as big a task as it might seem. The basics of what you need to do are separate the wet waste from dry. The rise in awareness has now led to people installing a compost wastebasket in their homes while being furnished.
This basket comes in two components. By segregating your waste as per the above-mentioned bifurcations, you leave the rest in the bin. It manages to store it securely and prevents the spread of infection until you can dispose of it.
Backyard composting
Unlike popular belief, backyard composting is one of the simplest ways of disposing of household waste. While it does require a push of investment from your side, making it a part of your lifestyle will be a cakewalk.
With a slight adjustment, you can curb down the garbage, which ends up as landfills and such. These ill-practices render large pieces of land useless and unfit for cultivation. The more such land is used, the more will the forests be cut down to make new spaces available. So, like a domino effect, your contribution can help get rid of harmful practices.
For your backyard composting to work successfully, you first need to invest in an effective compost bin purchase. It needs to be of reliable quality, robust, and easily recyclable. So even when its life runs out, it will not be harmful to the environment.
Secondly, make your compost as versatile as possible. Remember, the more the versatility of your compost, the healthier will it be. Be it half-eaten fruits or uneaten vegetables, these contain a good amount of water. If you combine them with dry waste like stale bread, fallen leaves, newspapers, or so, your result will be healthy.
While having less moisture content, in the beginning, can be fixed, it is difficult to balance out the opposite case. So, that is an extra bit of a pointer that you could keep in mind while disposing of household waste in backyard composting.
To keep the smell from taking over your backyard and eventually your house, you can shut it with a lid. By layering the waste with a thin roll of soil will stop the pests from surfacing.
Disposing of old batteries, computers and other electronics
that seems so So far you have primarily covered kitchen waste. Now we move on to something that seems so harmless and small but is quite harmful.
Batteries are poisonous when they break and leak out. These hazardous metals are heavy on the environment and can corrode the soil exposed to them. In case of a landfill gone out of hand, batteries can contaminate the soil and water to an immeasurable extent.
Take your phone, for example, or laptops and computers; they have a lithium-ion battery inside. The dangerous part about them is that they cannot stand extreme pressure or heat. So, if they fall and leak while being disposed of, they can cause hazardous damage to the environment.
To resolve this issue at hand, you must dispose of the batteries in specific drop-offs allocated by the authorities. As a part of the recycling initiative, you can also approach retailers in case they are willing to accept old batteries.
The same goes for computers, laptops, and other electronic appliances in your house. By contacting the local authorities, you will get further information specific to your area. And when you follow through, the environment will be a safer place than before!
In conclusion
Disposing of household waste can be quite a task, but people have been putting it off for way too long. It is time to take responsibility for our lethargy and ignorance because we owe that much to nature.
Besides, when you get into the habit of disposing of household waste smartly and responsibly, it will come naturally. You must consciously make it a part of your routine. Since you have found yourself at the end of the article, it is clear that your will is present.
Now all you have got to aim for is consistency!
Summary:
You use plenty of things in your everyday life. And once you are done with it, you dispose of them off in the most default way possible without realising it. This applies to a large demographic, spread all over the world. Unfortunately, it has also been an issue for a long time. The adverse effects that ignorance and convenience have had on nature is devastating. If people do not bring about a change from home, the rest would be a long shot.
However, it is unlikely for anyone to incorporate these methods into their life all of a sudden. One needs a motivator or a more concrete purpose. Meaning, for them to become a responsible citizen, they first need to realise why that need exists. By bringing out the impact of ill-practices on a personal, societal, and environmental level, the goal seems closer.
To be mindful in your practice of disposing of household waste, you can start with basic composting of kitchen waste. Taking a step further, backyard composting would make a tremendous impact, although it might need an investment initially. And lastly, ensure that batteries, computers, and other electronic gadgets are not negligently disposed of. By reaching out to the retailers or local authorities, you can find the best way to recycle or throw them. In none of the cases will the environment be at risk.
