The slogan ‘Reduce, reuse and recycle’Its main objective is to environmental care with regard to consumer behavior: the three words should function as axes and horizons for the sustainable behavior of families, and also of companies.
The slogan, coined by the non-governmental organization Greenpeace, It is easy to interpret, and the scope of each term is not too much greater than what is seen at first glance:
- Reduction: It refers to the decreasing generation of waste based on the exhaustive selection of those goods that are markedly necessary,
- Reuse: Consists in 'get the most out of it'To the goods that one has already decided to use since the norm is to dispose of them long before their maximum potential,
- Recycling: There is the conviction that, once discarded, it is very likely that it is totally or partially used for the generation of new goods, and is not a completely discarded object.
The "three R", name by which this is usually known ecological circuit, have a chronological dimension that unfolds throughout the consumption process: prior to the decision to purchase a product, during use of it and once its productive facet in society is completed. If you think about it in the opposite sense, the three essential elements for caring for the environment are at the same time three doctrines on which consumer society is generally based: the increase in consumer goods is contrary to the reduction, the message of discarding things and buying a new one is against reuse, and finally the idea created of the inconveniences and high costs of recycling are openly against recycling. Since the beginning of the new century, certain companies have made the decision to generate an image favorable to the sustainable use of resources, which sometimes generates a certain contradiction with their commercial aspirations.
The message of the 'three Rs' is clear and concrete: this is why it is easy to spread. To better illustrate what is being said with it, here are some examples of each of the activities promoted by this message:
- Have the prudence to think before each purchase if it is strictly necessary.
- Limit the use of disposable products as much as possible.
- Turn off all lights that are not in use in the house.
- Turn off the water tap when one is washing dishes, in the part that does not require the use of water.
- Limit the use of products with too much wrapping or packaging.
- Bring your own bag to the market, in such a way as not to need a new one there.
- Close the water tap well after use.
- Use the devices to the maximum of their potential, in order to optimize the number of uses.
- Reduce the emission of polluting gases.
- Participate in the opportunities to consume returnable (bottles, containers)
- Use the paper on both sides.
- Use the boxes and packaging of certain products for others.
- Adapt the functionalities of the products that do not have a marked use, such as the bottles that are transformed into glasses.
- Have an open mind when it comes to goods with a lot of flexibility in their treatment, such as wood that can often be modified in many ways.
- Giving away clothes whose size is no longer suitable for us or our children.
- Modify the apparent residues in such a way as to obtain a new product suitable for consumption. This is not too common, and it excels in transforming bottles into glasses, newspapers into liners or wrappers, drums into chairs, and notebooks into books.
- Separate the waste around its conditions for recycling. The colors of the containers have an organization for this purpose.
- In glass and plastics, heating them can give it a new shape.
- Organic matter (where food scraps appear) is often useful as soil compost.
- Place special emphasis on goods that take the longest to degrade from nature, such as soda or beer cans.
