After a long road trip, is your car littered with coffee cups, soda bottles, sandwich and candy bar wrappers? How many boxed lunches have you eaten at work meetings where the volume of trash exceeded the size of the food you ate? How many plastic cups, stirrers and empty snack bags have you accumulated at the end of a flight? We need food and drink to sustain us, but trash and plastics weigh us down.
The “three Rs” start with an R for Reduce, which means reducing the waste that we generate. Whether your next outing is across town, across the globe, or simply heading to your office, thinking ahead about food and drink away from home is an important step toward reducing waste in your daily life.
A few simple habits can go a long way toward reducing food-related trash:
* Avoid purchasing single-portion snack bags, instead buying in bulk and repacking into reusable containers.
* Plan your food ahead so that you can avoid fast-food or take-out meals and the inevitable wrapping.
* Say “no thank you” to straws.
* Carry your own travel kit: water bottle, utensils, and cloth napkin.
What are your ways of living lighter when eating away from home?
