Zero Waste mini conference held at UCV: Plastic Free July – Ecochallenge

ZERO WASTE BLOG

by Vivian Davidson

On July 3, 2022, the UCV environment team (Zero Waste group) met at the Unitarian Centre of Vancouver where over 10 people met in person and took in a varied Zoom Eco mini-conference with the input of other Unitarian Congregations, Beacon, North Shore and South Fraser.

Vancouver Unitarian Mary Bennett was moderator and time-keeper and did a very eloquent Chalice lighting with reading from Joanna Macy’s book Active hope.

The theme was Plastic Free July – Ecochallenge.

From the South Fraser Unitarian Congregation Donelda Henderson spoke about vegetable gardening and community food sharing; Dianne Dilts discussed how she makes yogurt and avoids plastic yogurt containers by using her own glass containers.

From the North Shore Unitarians, Shelley Hrdlitschka discussed the use of laundry strips while Shelley discussed compostable containers used by farmers. Barbara Kroon gave a very informative chat about home cleaning products and information about cornstarch containers.

And of course, getting to the source of where we buy products, the grocery store is an area where a lot of lobbying has to take place. So, to lead that discussion Teresa Morton from Beacon Unitarian Church shared a success story about Canadian Plastics Pact and the UN Plastics Pollution Treaty.

Towards the end of the event Vivian entertained a few questions about Reusable, single-use containers and cups as her video (link) was shared to those who RSVP’d to the meeting so they could formulate ideas and any questions they had. Several people in person and on Zoom shared how they take actions every day to reduce their reliance on single-use plastic items like taking their reusable mugs to cafes and bags to the grocery store.

Mary Bennett rounded up the event by sharing her use of ‘pee wipes’ and how it is much easier and user-friendly once one gets over the ‘oddity’ of it. It was mentioned by an in-person attendee that toilet paper is used mostly in Western countries but Asia and other parts of the world do not rely on it.

Other issues were discussed in conversations including eating insects as a sustainable protein source; reducing one’s transporting foot print by commuting, biking and ride-sharing; being involved with community gardening and more ‘connected to nature’ and very importantly, making sure to encourage friends and family as much as possible by sharing tips, updates and one’s own habits to remind others that change is not hard and often simple solution go a long way to making our world more sustainable.

Links and resources from the meeting:

More information from Plastic Free July here:

https://www.plasticfreejuly.org/

One-minute video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ByayHG5CscE

Zero Waste Unitarian group on Facebook: www.facebook.com/groups/zerowasteunitarian/

David Suzuki Queen of Green diy: https://davidsuzuki.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/queen-of-green-green-cleaning-recipes.pdf

Canada Plastics Pact: https://plasticspact.ca/

Go to vancouverunitarians.ca/zero-waste for more posts and upcoming events