General tips for a Zero Waste Christmas

• • Getting organized and having time: it is basic to prevent waste and save time and money

• • Prioritize values ​​and quality over immediacy and price

• • Wrap with tissues or newspaper (search “furoshiki” on Google and you will find many tutorials!)

• • Make manual and recycled decorations to avoid plastic and disposable things

• • Give what is necessary, quality and repairable

• • Buy in bulk, reusable and solid as much as you can. You can help yourself with our app!

• • Inform what you need, so they won’t give you anything unwanted that you won’t use.

• • On the Internet, avoid returns, they have a high environmental impact!

• • Before recycling, reduce and reuse as much as possible

Before buying anything…apply the pyramid of material needs in this order:

1. 1. Use what you already have

1. 1. borrow it

1. 1. Exchange it for something else: barter!

1. 1. Buy it second hand

1. 1. Rent it

1. 1. Do it yourself at home, get the crafts back!

1. 1. And if you have no choice… buy it!

If we asked ourselves these questions before buying anything and did not get carried away by the rush and wanting to have everything now… another rooster would crow!

6 reflections with proposals for a Zero Waste Christmas

1. Think in circles: the shift towards the Circular Economy

We live in a system based on the exploitation of resources that are thrown away at the end of their useful life. Changing the paradigm allows us to stop thinking about waste and start thinking about the garbage we generate as resources.

Can you imagine if nothing we made ended up in the trash because everything was reused at the end of its useful life? This eternal circulation of resources is what the Circular Economy defends It is nothing new: it is what Nature does in all its ecosystems, but human beings have built an economic system totally removed from this reality.

The first step towards a zero-waste Christmas is to change the glasses with which we see the world: going from a linear economy based on “use and throw away” to a circular one based on the eternal use of resources.

If you are interested in knowing more about the Circular Economy, we recommend the Ellen Macarthur Foundation website, the world reference on the subject. You will find plenty of resources and examples of companies that are already applying circularity to their activity.

2. Don’t throw food

It may seem very obvious to you, but it needs to be said. Did you know that it is estimated that a third of the world’s food is thrown away? We live in a world capable of generating food for all humanity and yet in some countries people suffer or die from hunger while in others obesity has become a pandemic.

The Christmas holidays are a time to eat a lot. It seems that the more and more exotic food the better. Abundance without responsibility leads to tons of wasted food, especially when eating out.

Therefore, if you cook at home…

• • Plan and calculate the amount of food you buy and cook

• • Store leftovers properly and eat or freeze them before they go bad.

• • Before you have to throw away, give away and share your leftover food

• • Learn useful recipes. A good example is cannelloni, croquettes or preserves!

And if you go out to eat, think about bringing a “tupperware” so you can take the leftover food home. Perhaps it is a gesture that embarrasses you because it is not very well seen. But worse is throwing away food that you have paid for and that is in good condition when someone else near you might need it.

Initiatives that prevent food waste:

When it comes to buying food or choosing restaurant options, there are more and more initiatives that work to take advantage of food that would otherwise be thrown away:

• • Es imperfect is a brand of jams made from “imperfect fruit.” They rescue pieces of fruit that do not meet measurement or shape standards and make jams with them. This way they avoid wasting food in perfect condition that would be discarded due to its appearance.

• • The Tasty Hour. It is an initiative born in Barcelona that rescues leftover pastry products and serves them at events and offices at a cheaper price.

• • Salvados Beeris a beer brand that recovers surplus bread and uses it to brew beer.

• • The app To Good To Go It shows you establishments with surplus food around you so you can pick up “surprise packs” at the last minute and avoid food being thrown away at the end of the day.

3. Give intangible gifts

Sometimes we give gifts for the sake of giving and end up filling our homes with objects of little use. Objects that end up being junk and that give us little while taking up space.

How about we use the money on non-material gifts? Here some examples:

• • Quality time and presence: in these times… it is the greatest of luxuries!

• • Experiences: do an adventure sports activity or have dinner for two at a special restaurant

• • Culture and shows: cinema, theater, museums, concerts… are experiences that are lived, shared and not forgotten

• • Education and knowledge: knowledge does not take up space, never better said! From a cheese tasting, a sewing workshop or a little help for that course you want to take… investing in education is always a good idea

4. Change the “have” to the “use”

It makes less and less sense to buy something and own it when you really just need to use it. This is what is called the change from product to service and we give you two clear cases of it:

• • Transportation: why spend money on an owned car or motorcycle that will spend most of its time parked on the street or in a garage when there are carsharing and motosharing options? There are more and more mobility options that allow us to pay for a service by minutes or hours instead of purchasing a vehicle and also paying for insurance and its repairs. How about giving away a three-month motosharing subscription? Services like eCooltra or Yego are examples of this.

• • Music. It is another quintessential case that we no longer need to buy the physical support of the old CD to enjoy our favorite music. . Thanks to streaming platforms such as. Spotify or Monkingme, you have music available on all your devices for free or by paying a monthly fee for the Premium option Less waste and many more advantages. How about giving a Spotify subscription as a gift?

The sharing economy: Sharing Economy

The phenomenon of the Collaborative Economy and the servitization of products is ensuring that resources are no longer underused and that we no longer depend on materials and property to satisfy a need.

One last example: why are you going to buy or give a drill this Christmas if you are really only going to use it on rare occasions? Instead, ask a neighbor, share it among several people or go to a “library of things“, an initiative that is spreading to more and more cities.

Another example that we like to share of collaborative consumption is the Lendi mobile application, an initiative that emerged in Barcelona that promotes sharing things we need among neighbors.

5. Gift to last

Since you are going to buy or give something, let it be something of quality that will last as long as possible.
We recommend that before purchasing anything you ask yourself these questions:

• • Do you really need it?

• • Is it designed to last?

• • Is it reusable or single use?

• • Can it be repaired easily?

• • Can it be given a second life at the end of its use?

• • Can it be recycled well?

Sometimes we don’t have all the answers, but taking these factors into account before buying anything will help everything last longer and take longer to become waste.

Against planned obsolescence… repair!

Although we carefully ask ourselves the above questions, many objects are designed and created to last a short time. This way the manufacturer ensures that within a certain period of time you need to buy it again. This is what is called Programmed Obsolescence and it is something that must be radically changed because we cannot base our economic model on companies manufacturing poor quality objects so that their survival is based on us continuing to buy from them.

In Barcelona there are two very interesting initiatives that make it easier for citizens to extend the useful life of their objects:

• • Millor que nou (Better than new): public repair shops for small appliances and miscellaneous objects

• • Reparatruck: a truck that provides free mobile repair service, an initiative of the Solidança entity.

6. Give support to a better world

There are a lot of projects out there fighting to create a better and more sustainable world. So why not dedicate a portion of our money to supporting transformative causes? Here are some examples to give as gifts:

• • An annual fee to an association or ONG that fights for a cause with which you identify

• • A contribution to a crowdfunding or micro-patronage campaign for a project that you think is worthwhile on one of the existing platforms: Ulule, Verkami, Goteo…

• • Purchase of products from an initiative that contributes to the Social and Solidarity Economy

• • Launched by local and proximity initiatives, whether food products, artists or others.

How to recognize a good gift?

Although it is sometimes difficult to find the perfect product, when we are faced with many options to buy the same thing, you can use the criterion of evaluating the option that meets the greatest number of these responsible consumption criteria:

• • Sustainability

• • Proximity

• • Fair Trade

• • Solidarity

• • Social inclusion

• • No unnecessary waste