June 4, 2020
What you can do to help this World Environment Day
June 5 marks World Environment Day, a day that has been celebrated every year since 1974, engaging governments, businesses, and citizens to focus their efforts on a pressing environmental issue.
This year’s theme is biodiversity – triggered by the recent global events including bushfires in Australia, Brazil and the United States, as well as locust infestations in East Africa. These events highlight how interconnected humans are and how precious our ecosystems are.
So, what can you do to help lessen your impact on our ecological systems? The United Nations has put together some simple tips to help inspire individuals to take action.
- Change your diet to more environmentally friendly foods, especially your main protein sources
- Travel less – limit your travel when things go back to normal after the Coronavirus pandemic
- Leave some wild green spaces in your garden where pollinators and ground-dwelling insects can thrive
- Let your city and national governments know that it is important they meet environmental targets they’ve pledged
- Avoid buying single-use plastics. Plastic waste that ends up in nature is often mistaken for food by animals both on land and at sea. For many species, it can cause severe injury and death.
- Recycle as much as you can
- Plant an urban garden on your balcony or backyard or get involved in supporting a community urban garden with native flowering plants
- Minimize use of household chemicals that can have toxic effects on soil and groundwater. Instead, experiment with natural products, such as vinegar and plain old soap and water.
- Create a compost in your garden or windowsill and grow some of your own produce
- Explore how to buy locally produced products and foods
One of the reasons we’re passionate about the return of unwanted or expired medicines is that it keeps millions of kilograms of pharmaceutical waste out of Australian waterways, groundwater and soil. In fact, since the project started we’ve collected and safely incinerated over 10,000,000kg of unwanted medicine.
We urge you to take action by returning any unwanted or expired medicine to your local pharmacy this World Environment Day. You will not only be keeping our house safe, but you will be contributing to a cleaner, safer environment. Visit our FAQs to find out more about the RUM project.
To read more about this year’s World Environment Day and events in your area visit the official website.