Making personal plan

Trainers motivate students to plan their individual actions to improve their capacity on the subject of zero-waste living. Individual plan may head towards understanding ideas, good practices related to zero-waste lifestyle; practice at home / university about what related to this topic.

Suggestions for the options below will help students visualize:

(1) Build a signature village The countryside in Vietnam has many features to attract tourists such as peace, fresh air, cultural values, history, nature, environment, etc. If the village community know how to promote the feature in their village, many other issues related to waste management and enhancing quality of life will be improved.

Our pride of the country is always there. Therefore, how to promote this factor and to associate it with protecting the value of the village is the question. If the village becomes special in terms of values the village has, the waste management will be a valuable asset to the villagers themselves.

Villages in Hoi An are typical examples. People are aware that tourism require cleanliness. Tra Que Vegetable Village - Hoi An City has impressed visitors when traveling on the roads with no rubbish. The peaceful village, growing vegetables throughout the year has attracted domestic and foreign tourists. People in the village have joined to promote this value more through the maintenance of environmental sanitation. As a result, the value of this village becomes even more special.

Another example is the Painting village (Bich Hoa village), Tam Thanh commune, Tam Ky city, Quang Nam province. This is a traditional fishing village. In the past, garbage was everywhere, tourists do not know this place and people’s lives are still dependent entirely on fishing.

However, the habitat in Bich Hoa village has changed completely as most of the houses leading into the village are painted with many different images. This has created a new space for this village. Since then, many visitors know and have created a new flow of tourism for this place. As a result, the income of households increased due to the accompanying services such as keeping motorbikes, car rental, selling refreshment,... Being aware of the importance of village space, all people are more conscious in waste management. Domestic waste is collected and processed better. The village becomes more beautiful.

(2) Waste will become production materials and rural areas is free of thrash Waste is a concept understood different by each person. If an object is not used and thrown away, it becomes garbage. However, if we use the object for other purposes, it is no longer garbage.

In fact, we can recycle or reuse most of the material disposed of in our daily lives. This can be applied directly to the household itself or to the relocation of other households who needs the materials that other household generates.

For example, we use tires to make children’s playgrounds, plant trees, or decorations in gardens or cafes; use plastic bottles to grow vegetables for limited land or living spaces;

(3) Say No! Students can practice saying No and choose an action to spread over facebook. For example: Say No to plastic straw, plastic bags, sterofoam box

(4) Making bins for the community or university (5) Compose play and/or song about zero-waste (6) Organize in weekend fair selling handicrafts (7) Organize an exchange fair to trade old stuff for books or for seed funding.

7-day challenge to switch to a zero-waste lifestyle, why not?

Source: Facebook Diên Đinh

Along with the strong development of society, the environmental pollution caused by domestic waste is becoming more common, polluting not only in urban areas but also in rural areas. Today, Vietnam produces 12 million tons of waste daily. Every year the world releases about 2.5 to 4 billion tons of waste. This seriously affects the quality of the environment as well as the quality of life of people. So what should we do to reduce the amount of waste each day? Let’s explore this 7-day journey to convert to a zero-waste lifestyle.

DAY 1: SINGLE – USE PRODUCTS

Instead of plastic cups, disposable paper cups, use eco-friendly products Every time we go to the market we bring home a lot of plastic bags. When going out for drinks they give us plastic cups, paper cups with straws. Buying food out, they even give foam box, not only plastic spoon, bamboo chopsticks. All are disposable. Disposable products produce a huge amount of waste each day. Therefore, the first principle is absolutely not to use disposable products. Solution: Bring fabric bags and glass boxes to the market. Cloth bags for vegetables, glass containers for watery and meat. Although it is quite bulky, get use to this habit will reduce plastics. Go to the cafe also carry bottles to buy. If you are a ‘fan’ of straws, look for a bamboo or inox straw so you do not have to throw them away after using them.

DAY 2: COMPOSTING Without plastic bags, what would we use to store organic waste while cooking? Solution: Learn a simple way to do composting Step 1: Choose a composting box If you have a garden, dig a hole and put organic waste into it, cover it afterwards so that thrash can bio-degrade. If not, you can pick a wooden or plastic box which a size relevant to the amount of waste in your house, dig a hole for water and air run off. Step 2: Choose where to place the box Place it where water can run off. It’s better to place it on earthen floor than cement floor. Or you can put it on the balcony to attract more sunlight and not pollute space inside the house. Step 3: Waste classification Providing nunitions to plants is very important, in which carbon and nitrogen is irreplaceable to the development of plants. We can divide organic waste into 2 types: green provides nitrogen and brown provides carbon.

Note: do not choose waste from meat, egg, milk, fish or processed food for composting because they can cause pollution and harm the good bacteria

GREEN BROWN

PLANTS FOOD SCRAPS STRAW, CLOTH SCRAPS,

HAIR GRASS CLIPPINGS NEWSPAPERS, TOILET PAPERS SAWDUST

MANURE COFFEE TEABAGS EGG SHELLS

Step 4: Composting One layer of organic waste followed by one thin layer of soil, sometimes mix them up and keep the humidity level of 40% - 60%, after a month you will have compost. What needed for composting: organic matters, humidity, oxygen, micro-organism.

DAY 3: REPLACING CHEMICALS

Lemon, gleditsia and soap nut are substitutes for chemical products Every month, there are many bottles for shampoo, shower gel ... are discharged into the environment. So one thing to change is to stop using these chemicals. Not only that, the plastic micro-beads in the shampoo, toothpaste or cleanser are very toxic both to the environment and to ourselves. Solution: Replace the detergents with natural products.

If you feel uncomfortable, you should buy natural products in credible stores. If you have time, make the natural products at home with family members.

DAY 4: PLASTICS AND PACKAGING

A huge amount of waste comes from these packaging Solution: Change plastic containers to glass to be environmentally friendly and safe for your health. Use bamboo brushes, bamboo straws instead of plastic ones. The principle is to replace all household waste products into longer-lasting and friendlier materials. Also, limit the use of packaged food. Instead of buying what’s already packed, take time to cook your own meals at home. Gradually you will get used to it and improve your cooking skills.

DAY 5: WASTE CLASSIFICATION

ORGANIC WASTE INORGANIC WASTE

Waste when not being classified, but put together it is very easy to pollute the environment.

When handling all types of waste, it is easy to cause chemical or physical reactions that are dangerous to human beings and the environment. So, it is better to sort out waste so that they are treated the best way. Solution: There are two types of waste: organic waste and inorganic waste. Organic waste, you can compost. Inorganic waste is divided into three types: (1) recyclable (paper, metal, spongy, plastic bottles); (2) toxic waste (mercury, fluorescent bulbs) and those that need to be destroyed or buried; (3) Electronic waste (battery, telephone...). For each type of thrash, look for suitable disposal methods such as selling to be recycled, treated in specialized collection...

DAY 6: RECYCLE, REUSE

Recycled products are environmentally friendly Around us there are many things that can be recycled or reused instead of being thrown away. But few people care about it rather than just want to throw them out of the house as soon as possible when they are no longer as valuable. Solution: Learn and recycle old items such as clothes, bottles... into new, useful things to continue using, contributing to reduce the amount of waste to the environment.

DAY 7: THINK AND DO Always think about what you can change in your daily life to minimize waste and protect the environment. When buying something, think about where it comes from, and where it will go after. From then on, we learn the habit of finding environmentally-friendly products that can replace what we usually use. Because only when you think and act, our environment can be green - clean - beautiful.

PART 04

Reference

1. Center for Development of Community Initiative and Environment (C&E), 2016, Ecological lifestyle: trainer guidebook 2. Center for Development of Community Initiative and Environment (C&E), 2017, Guidebook on integration of ecological lifestyle into educational program for youth (Topic: Sustainable water use, Sustainable food consumption, Responsible tourism) 3. Center for Development of Community Initiative and Environment (C&E), Action Center for the

City Development (ACCD) 2013, We learn to live green, Education publisher 4. Center of Dictionary, 2017, Vietnamese Dictionary, Đà Nẵng publisher. 5. David McKay, 2012, Eco-city Indicators, Oregon Planner Magazine, issue November and

December 6. Dean Thompson, 2009, Sino-Singapore Tianjin Eco-City: A case study of an emergin eco-city in China, The World Bank. 7. English – Vietnamese and Vietnamese-English Environmental Dictionary, Science and

Technology Publisher, Hà Nội, 1995. 8. Hiroaki Suzuki & nnk (2010), Eco2 cities: Ecological cities as economic cities, The World

Bank. 9. Hoornweg, Daniel with Laura Thomas, 1999, What A Waste: Solid Waste Management in

Asia, Working Paper Series Nr. 1. Urban Development Sector Unit. East Asia and Pacific

Region. Page 5 10. MONRE, 2015, National Environment Status Report 2011-2015, Ban Do publisher. 11. MONRE, 2016, National Environment Status Report 2016 – Section: Urban environment 12. Prof.PhD. Nguyễn Văn Phước, 2008, Textbook: Solid waste treatment and management, Xay

Dung publisher. 13. Trương Minh Đến, 2016, Guidebook on technique of growing red worms environmentally friendly 14. Trương Minh Đến, 2016, Guidebook on technique of rural waste treatment

REFERENCE FROM WEBSITE

1. https://vi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ch%E1%BA%A5t_th%E1%BA%A3i 2. http://www.baoxaydung.com.vn/news/vn/the-gioi/kinh-nghiem-quan-ly-va-xu-ly-rac-thaitren-the-gioi.html 3. http://infonet.vn/the-gioi-xu-ly-rac-thai-nhu-the-nao-post210990.info 4. http://tapchimattran.vn/the-gioi/rac-thai-thach-thuc-moi-truong-nghiem-trong-tren-toancau-7077.html 5. http://baochinhphu.vn/Du-lich/Hoi-An-xay-dung-thanh-pho-sinh-thai/318486.vgp 6. http://freepdfs.net/kien-tao-mot-thanh-pho-sinh-thai-kinh-nghiem-portland-va-h-psu/813ed59 841879b777240932aaf31cd1e/ 7. https://sohoa.vnexpress.net/photo/doi-song-so/noi-lam-viec-lon-nhat-mien-trung-cua-ky-suphan-mem-3391023.html 8. https://baomoi.com/tap-chi-gia-dinh-moi-gia-dinh-moi/p/350.epi 9. http://www.sokhoahoccongnghe.phutho.gov.vn/TinTuc/Tintuc_Detail.aspx?ID=1669