Resolving the waste crisis

Image credit: Chantel Bann

I was out on a walk the other day and spotted a ‘FREE’ sign in front of someone’s house above a couple of art frames, a lamp, clothes rack, mirror, a chair and some books. It’s pretty common to see household items on the sidewalk, free for passers-by to take. I’ve come across everything from sofas to tvs, suitcases, washing machines, clothes, printers, desks, electronics and even fresh fruit.

I found out about a community Facebook group called Street Bounty Inner West where locals in a suburb can post reusable items they see in the street for anyone to pick up. The group aims to “promote the recycling and reuse of materials, keeping kerbs cleaner, landfill emptier and wallets fuller.” Movements like this divert so much stuff from going to landfills. However, sometimes these items can get damaged on the sidewalk by exposure to weather conditions: rain, extreme sun and wind. And/or eventually still end up in landfill if nobody takes it.

Images credit top row L to R: Kimberly Scott, Fi Paskulich, Anna Bailey, Obaydah Vetter. Second row L to R: Nicky Lewis, Sarah Bea, Carolyn Veg Ienna and Vanessa Jimenez.

The world’s waste

According to The World Counts, the world dumps 2.12 billion tonnes of waste each year. If it were all put on trucks, it would stretch around the earth 24 times! Part of the reason why this figure is so high is that 99% of the stuff we purchase is trashed within 6 months. According to the World Bank, global waste is expected to grow to 3.40 billion tonnes by 2050. A huge majority of the world’s waste is generated by countries in the global North like Australia, the US, the UK, and Canada.

According to Australia’s National Waste Report 2020, Australians generated around  74.1 million tonnes of waste in 2018-19 (this includes household waste, organics, masonry materials and ash). Community efforts like Street Bounty that salvage household waste from landfills by donating to random strangers are a noble act. Many movements like this are doing fantastic work in tackling the waste problem but they can only capture a tiny fraction of the overall waste that exists.

Planned obsolescence

It’s fair to say that planned obsolescence is probably the biggest factor behind the tremendously high amount of waste. It’s a modern capitalist trend that’s been a massive catalyst for manifesting more waste in the last few decades than humanity has ever witnessed. Planned obsolescence is a strategy during manufacture that ensures products are deliberately designed with an artificially limited useful life or designed to eventually slow down or become obsolete. This guarantees that consumers will regularly want to replace these products in the future. The purpose of this strategy is for corporations to gain stable and increased profits. The outcome is a massive increase in waste to landfills and huge greenhouse gas emissions that contribute to climate change and environmental degradation.  

Image credit: How-To Geek

Common waste streams

E-waste

Electronic waste (e-waste) is the quickest growing domestic waste stream. On a global scale, we generate over 50 million tonnes of e-waste each year. Only 20% of this is formally recycled. That comes to about 7.3 kilograms per person and the equivalent in weight to 350 cruise ships. The e-waste produced annually is worth over $62.5 billion. A lot of e-waste is toxic and gets exported to poorer countries in the global South where they end up polluting the environment in these countries and also in their landfills. 

The average Australian household produces about 73 kg of e-waste a year. With a projection of a global total e-waste increase to 74.7 million tonnes (almost twice the amount of new e-waste in just 16 years). Planned obsolescence is a big feature in the electronics industry.  

In 2018, Italy fined Samsung and Apple for purposely slowing down older models of their phones. Their plan was for people to get annoyed with the slowness of their phones to the point where they were forced to buy the newest and much more expensive models.

Image credit: Carolyn Veg Ienna

Furniture waste

With the popularity of flatpack furniture over the last few decades, there’s been a boom in furniture waste. When people are relocating, it can be more convenient to throw away old or damaged furniture instead of repairing or paying to move them to the new location.

Each year, Americans throw out more than 12 million tons of furniture and furnishings, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. Only a small percentage is recycled. And in Australia, households dispose of around 24 kg of wooden furniture each year.

Image credit: Blake Milne

Images credit: Bee Yolanda, Clare Marshall, Jobi-Zane Pixus and Tom.

Waste from fashion & textiles

We’re producing about 150 billion garments a year with only 7.8 billion humans. It’s not surprising that 84% of all new clothing produced ends up in landfills each year. Fast fashion is to blame for these alarming figures.

Fast fashion brands through clever marketing amongst other things manipulate consumers into buying new clothes every few days or every week. These clothes usually get thrown out very quickly as trash and a huge portion is exported to countries in the global South where they eventually pollute those environments. Overconsumption is a modern cultural trend that’s detrimental to people and the planet. Fashion trends are one of the things that fuel fashion waste.

Image credit: CALPIRG

Solving the waste crisis

Australia has a national target of recovering 80% of waste by 2030. To make ambitious goals like this in Australia and other countries a reality, we’ll have to do a lot more than sidewalk donations. It’s so necessary to break the planet-destroying linear cycle of stuff that goes from retail to buyer then landfill in less than a year. In spite of planned obsolescence and our behaviours around consumption, many items are still useful and can be repurposed. A couple of ideas:

1. Make profits for yourself and charities

Reselling has always been a phenomenal way to divert waste from landfills and make a profit. However, CharityBay is next level! On this platform, you can do both of these things and help charities at the same time. People can sell items and donate some or all profits to a chosen charity. Imagine if all the stuff abandoned on the street and the useable stuff sent to landfill were resold for charity.  

2. Rescue, Reuse, Repair, Repurpose

There are many community groups like the Street Bounty Inner West group that support waste reduction. You might find similar groups through a search on social media platforms. If you can’t find one for your local community then create one.

With a little love, imagination and a makeover, many items have the potential for a magical transformation into something ‘new’, useful and maybe even beautiful. Imagine what our societies would be like if repairing and upcycling were as much a cultural habit as overconsumption?

Image credit: Imran Zainal © Imran’s Ark via iProperty

3. Legislation and policy change

Local community action is very powerful but it’s only one piece of the puzzle. We have to have laws in effect that ban planned obsolescence. And

• hold corporations accountable for ensuring durability and lifelong repair guarantee in the products they make

•  limit the number of goods manufactured to a reasonable number in harmony with planetary resources and product demand / usage

•  hold corporations accountable if they do not comply with these laws.

 ♥ Nina Gbor

Insta: @eco.styles

Christmas is the greatest annual environmental disaster

Black Friday (November 26th) marked the annual initiation into this season's global overconsumption ritual. It usually starts with Black Friday, goes into Christmas, gets hotter on Boxing Day, then New Year's and all throughout January. It's a lot! Our modern culture has set up this period as the festival of superfluous consumption. So it’s primed for voracious use of material things far beyond any other time of the year. This is why environmentalists say Christmas is the greatest environmental disaster.

Marked by the biggest displays of excessive advertising, manipulative sales tactics, oversupply and mindless buying with almost no consideration for the environmental cost to the earth, the wellbeing of humans involved in supply chain and raw materials extracted to manufacture the products.

80% of clothes purchased on Black Friday are reportedly thrown away after one wear. Some environmentalists say Christmas is the world's greatest environmental disaster.

To be fair, the underprivileged & marginalised groups, the season is an opportunity to afford little luxuries and needed items beyond regaular price range.

However, there's more than enough resources to cater for everyone's basic needs if we commit to taking care of people and planet. Especially if we embrace systemic global equity, equality and let go of capitalism's principles of placing profiteering well over the wellbeing of humans and the earth.

If we did this, there will be far less poverty, fewer marginalised groups and very likely little need for charity.

Holidays have become far removed from their founding history, origins and cultures. And morphed into meaningless, superficial rites of spending to enrich corporations that often contribute to high emissions and human exploitation.

So, what if we had new ways to celebrate the holidays from now on by completely moving away from the outdated model of buying stuff we don't need for others and ourselves? Like showing our affection for loved ones in ways that go beyond the material e.g. giving our loved ones the gift of our PRESENCE instead of material PRESENTS (unless absolutely necessary)? Presence can mean several things! Like new experiences, listening without judgement, volunteering to help, donating your time to do what the other person wants, making sure someone(s) feels heard, etc.

Alternatively, meaningful secondhand or handmade gifts to support small businesses that have minimal carbon footprint.

Why empowering refugees and migrants is crucial

Image by Belinda Fewings, courtesy Unsplash

I recently took part in a fundraiser style challenge for a social enterprise and charity called The Social Outfit. It was in alignment with National Refugee Week and to raise funds for female refugees and new migrants. National Refugee Week is Australia’s peak annual event to educate and inform the public about refugees and celebrate positive contributions made by refugees to Australian society. During the week, many truths and lived experiences of refugees and new migrants were shared in the media and on social platforms. And it got me thinking about the global refugee problem. Despite circumstances like conflict, human rights violations, public order disruptions, violence and persecution that turned ‘ordinary’ people into refugees, they sometimes still encounter discrimination, judgement and inequality in their host countries instead of compassion.

Why refugees should be empowered and supported

First and foremost, the most crucial factor in hosting refugees is and should always be to ensure the protection of people where their liberty, life, safety and other fundamental human rights are at stake. With this in mind, empathy should be the cornerstone for dealing with refugee matters. Subsequently, it’s worth discovering and utilising the enormous source of potential that refugees possess and using it to enrich the nation.  

Economic and social development - The presence of refugees and migrants boosts and diversifies the country’s skill levels. It bolsters innovation and resilience. Refugees often have a strong desire to settle and adapt into their new environments and for this reason, seek to gain employment shortly after arriving in the host country. And bring high levels of skills, qualifications and work experience that too often end being under-utilised. According to a research report by the Australian Government Department of Immigration and Citizenship, around 49.3% of refugees who participated in one West Australian study were employed in occupations below their skill level. The massive reserve of potential can contribute tremendously to the country’s economic, social and cultural growth. All this potential gets lost or diminished when refugees and migrants are not sufficiently supported and empowered.

Entrepreneurship and business - The research report also stated that refugees have a penchant for being entrepreneurial because they are confronted with an urgency to establish themselves in their new environment. This is evident in the 2000 Business Review Weekly’s annual rich list of 200 people. Five out of eight billionaires were people whose families have originally arrived in Australia as refugees.

Strengthening international ties and post-colonial recovery - On the other side, hosting refugees strengthens international ties and relationships with poorer countries. Countries in the global South are still suffering from the aftermath of colonisation. In some nations, it has resulted in conflict, civil unrest or some of the other refugee circumstances I mentioned previously. One of the most poignant examples is the Rwandan genocide in 1994. Belgian colonisers in Rwanda created tension between two ethnic groups: the Hutus and the Tutsis in the 1930s by making a policy that established the Tutsis as the monarchs and elite ruling class. This ethnic division began the conflict between the two groups that later degenerated into genocide. And hence, birthed refugees fleeing conflict. Colonisation in several cases has proven to be the root cause of issues that create refugees. Supporting refugees and migrants helps to strengthen international ties and, in some situations, might be a small contribution towards healing the issues created by the global North colonising regions in the global South.  

 ♥ Nina Gbor

Instagram: @eco.styles

A style challenge for positive change

In my last article, I wrote about the 2020 #WearTheChange style challenge fundraiser. Wear The Change is a fundraiser created by The Social Outfit (TSO), a social enterprise, charity and ethical clothing label. The challenge is to style an ethical/sustainable garment in a different way (restyle) for five days during National Refugee Week (June 20 – 25). The purpose is to raise funds to help TSO support, empower and train female refugees and new migrants with customised training, education and employment pathways in the fashion industry.

TSO ran the style challenge again this year, so I felt the pressure to up the ante with this beautiful, pink, vintage-retro silk Japanese kimono. The kimono is a post-lockdown present I gifted to myself at the end of 2020 after a very long and intense lockdown period in Melbourne, Australia.

Retro-vintage kimono styled with kimono belts and a pink preloved clutch purse from an op shop.

The allure of the kimono

I love traditional, vintage Japanese wedding, ceremonial and casual kimonos. They hold tremendous beauty, art, storytelling, craftsmanship and copious amounts of my attention. Vintage and antique kimonos are some of the most beautiful garments ever created in my opinion.  

By choosing a kimono for the 2021 restyle challenge, I made it harder because it’s rare to see a wide variety of kimono restyled looks. But I chose it nonetheless because this pink one is an exquisite piece with vibrant colours that inspire tremendous amounts of awe, joy and MAGIC.

If my knowledge is accurate then I believe this kimono is a wedding kimono called Hikifurisode (a kimono with long, flowing sleeves and a padded, trailing hem). It’s a more modern take on the traditional wedding kimono, likely from the late 1980s. I’ve been told that it might have been a wedding or ceremonial piece for a young woman. And it's 100% silk.

Retro-vintage kimono styled with a 1930 / 1940s vintage fur cape from an op shop. Paired with a 1950s handbag from a vintage shop.

Regarding Asian-made

In addition to being my challenge centrepiece, it’s also a conversation piece for important topics like the perception of products made in Asian countries. In the fashion world and other industries, we hear comments like 'cheap Asian stuff' or 'cheap Chinese stuff' flooding the fast fashion markets. However, the fast fashion model thrives because we indulge it. In many cases, it’s fast fashion brands in the global North that commission the manufacture of cheaply made fast fashion products in Asian countries. Because labour is cheap in those parts of the world, it’s easier to exploit workers in those countries. Then it’s the consumers that help this concept to continue when we buy and consume fast fashion in droves without demanding that brands pay living wages and decent work conditions for garment workers. Perhaps we can shift the notion of perceiving Asian countries simply as where cheap products come from. Instead, we can shift perspective and engage more respectfully with Asian and other regions where products are made by acknowledging the craftsmanship, art, meaning and storytelling behind the art that’s native to these regions. The traditional kimono is a case in point. Because the history, skills, dexterity in making the products, traditions and symbolism are not cheap. They deserve respect.  

Retro-vintage kimono styled with a preloved gold jumpsuit, preloved jewellery and gold court shoes. All from op shops. The look is completed with a white purse.

Retro-vintage kimono styled with a retro t-shirt, preloved blue jeans, yellow sneakers and rattan box purse. All from op shops.

The Social Outfit fundraiser for National Refugee Week

For the second year in a row, I’ve joined in the challenge to contribute to raising awareness and raising funds towards helping The Social Outfit support, empower and train new migrants and female refugees with customised training, education and employment pathways in the fashion industry. Only 20% of women from refugee backgrounds are engaged in the workforce. Work empowers women and employment is important for a positive settlement experience. The focus is on the first Australian jobs because the first job is the hardest to get. 85% of people who have worked at The Social Outfit have moved on to other employment. Empowering women is critical because when women are empowered, the community, society and the entire nation benefits economically, socially and in many other ways.

And 49 people have been employed since 2014, paying over $846,000 AUD in Australian award wages. Almost 500 people have participated in their training programs.

By donating, you can help this legacy to continue to thrive and to grow. It won’t solve the global refugee crisis, however, it’s an exemplary model of how refugees and new migrants can be empowered to successfully and beneficially integrate into society in a highly productive way for everyone. The fundraiser continues. On that note, TSO and I will be tremendously grateful for donations to their work through my fundraising link here: https://wear-the-change.raisely.com/nina-gbor. Thank you!

Retro-vintage kimono styled with a preloved navy, tulle maxi skirt and preloved tan belt. Both items from op shops. The beaded clutch purse was a hand-me-down.

♥ Nina Gbor

Instagram: @eco.styles

Wear the change

Outfit restyled for The Social Outfit’s Wear The Change fundraiser challenge during National Refugee Week 2020. One dress styled in five different ways. This is the ultra gold glamourous look.

Imagine a person with a ‘normal’ life. This person might be a doctor, waiter, lawyer, teacher, parent, accountant, nanny, architect, daughter/son - anything. They probably have a career, social life, community or even family. Then some type of cataclysm happens like war, natural disaster, climate or other disasters. On fear of death, this person and their family must leave everything behind and flee to safety in another place or country. Maybe even with young children in tow. Literally for the purpose of saving their lives. Thus, rendering them refugees. This is not the scenario for every refugee but it’s a general account I’ve heard from several refugees from different countries.

As one of the most terrifying things that can happen to a person, I’m always baffled when I hear that refugees sometimes encounter a lack of empathy or even disdain because of their status. It’s shocking considering the very real and intense nature of experiences, pain and trauma that forced them into the circumstance they find themselves in.

According to the United Nations High Commission on Refugees (UNHCR), there were 82.4 million forcibly displaced people worldwide at the end of 2020 from conflict, human rights violations, conflict, public order disruption, violence and persecution. Out of this figure, 26.4 million are refugees.

Outfit restyled for The Social Outfit’s Wear The Change fundraiser challenge during National Refugee Week 2020. One dress styled in five different ways. This is the smart casual look.

This week, June 20 – 27 is National Refugee Week. It’s a special celebration of the contributions of refugees to the arts, culture and our society. Refugees and migrants bring a wealth of skills, talent, culture and knowledge that can further enrich communities if given the right opportunity. All this potential for social and economic growth is lost when they're not supported. When women are empowered, the community, society and nation benefits.

Outfit restyled for The Social Outfit’s Wear The Change fundraiser challenge during National Refugee Week 2020. One dress styled in five different ways. This is the semi-corporate, sophisticated dressed up look.

Last year during National Refugee Week I took part in a restyle challenge fundraiser by The Social Outfit (TSO) called Wear the Change to raise funds for their training and support programs for refugee and new migrant women in Australia. (See photos above and below). TSO is a social enterprise and ethical clothing brand that celebrates creativity and diversity, employs and trains people from refugee and new migrant communities. Adapting and getting the first job can be challenging for new migrants and refugees. TSO helps women with this transition process by supporting them to thrive through employment. The invaluable training these women receive helps them learn new skills and it also allows their previous skills and natural skills to unfurl more easily. I’m excited to be an ambassador for this campaign again this year and take part in the style challenge like I did last year.

Outfit restyled for The Social Outfit’s Wear The Change fundraiser challenge during National Refugee Week 2020. One dress styled in five different ways. This is the elegant and formal look.

The style challenge is about wearing one garment in five different ways. To raise funds for the fundraiser, each weekday this week, I’ll post a photo of the same garment styled differently. So, follow me on Instagram to see the new garment I’ve chosen for 2021 restyle challenge and how I change up the look of the garment each day. But most importantly, I’ll be massively thankful if you can join me in supporting TSO and the women they help by making a donation through this link: https://wear-the-change.raisely.com/nina-gbor/ No amount is too small. Thanks in advance!

Outfit restyled for The Social Outfit’s Wear The Change fundraiser challenge during National Refugee Week 2020. One dress styled in five different ways. This is the super casual look.

Outfit restyled for The Social Outfit’s Wear The Change fundraiser challenge during National Refugee Week 2020. One dress styled in five different ways. This is the golden chic, creative look.

♥ Nina Gbor

Instagram: @eco.styles