Earth Hour 2019: Iza Calzado Shares 6 Easy-To-Follow Tips To Help Save The Planet
Ensuring that Mother Earth remains bountiful and beautiful for generations to come is by no means a small task, but actress and environmental advocate Iza Calzado assures us that the feat can be accomplished if we start on our own, one doable action at a time.
In preparation for Earth Hour, a worldwide initiative launched by the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) that encourages individuals to shut down and turn off non-essential electric appliances and lights for 60 minutes as a commitment to saving the earth, Iza shares six of her easy-to-follow tips for Filipinos who want to join in on the cause.
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1. Tumblers, tumblers, tumblers galore
She cannot emphasize enough the importance of always having your own beverage container with you wherever you go, as often as possible! Considering that single-use plastic products (e.g.: plastic water and soda bottles, disposable straws, bottle cap protectors, even bottle plastic labels) are one of the earth's biggest contaminants, it should pretty much be imperative to have your own reusable container with you as an alternative.
Leave one in the car, have one ready in your gym locker, assign one to your office desk, and have a travel-sized one to bring on shopping dates or to the movies. Once a habit, this action goes a long way.
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2. Become fashion-conscious
But in a more environmentally-friendly way.
As someone in the entertainment industry whose job is to look amazing practically all day, every day, Iza shifts our attention to being comfortable with repeating outfits, which in turn, should ideally lead to everyone shopping less. The reason being that purchasing clothes, without most of us knowing, takes a huge toll on the environment.
The sourcing and manufacturing processes, all the way to the shipment and storage, use up way more natural resources than people realize.
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3. Bayongs are in
In a year, how many of those transluscent, flimsy colored plastic bags from the wet market does each Filipino household bring home and throw away? The number is likely too high to remember, which, sadly, spells death for dozens and dozens of marine species who mistake them for food, or get entangled in them once they make their way to our oceans.
One way to combat this is to bring back the use of recyclable (and these days, the fashionable!) bayongs. Often made from organic materials (or a more forgiveable form of sturdy plastic that's meant to be in use for years and years), take one with you to the wet market next time.
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4. Seriously, segregate!
Though it's easier to just dump all waste from our homes into one big pile for the garbage truck to pick up every night, it really is, quite frankly, the lazy thing to do according to society's more eco-friendly ways of living these days. The new rule of thumb is to break things down into the two basic categories of waste that any grade schooler can identify without difficulty: biodegradable and non-biodegradable.
By doing so, each waste group is brought to the proper places, be they recycling or repurposing facilities, or processing plants that are capable of turning organic matter into useful end products like fertilizer or in more advanced cases, fuel. And yes—Iza and husband Ben Wintle do segregate in their own home!
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5. Travel smart
And Iza doesn't just mean learning how to budget and pack efficiently.
She instead refers to knowing what your planned travel itineraries entail, and learning beforehand if an attraction you wish to visit is compliant with environmental regulations. And if you find that something in your agenda promotes irresponsible tourism? Don't support it.
Some examples to keep in mind are saying no to animal attractions that violate regulations of keeping wildlife in captivity (research on water park shows and animal circus acts), not booking a place to stay in locations infamous for prioritizing profit over protection of the environment (thank God Boracay has changed!), and activities that disregard natural resources for the sake of tourism (think Bohol way back in the day when anyone could hold tarsiers in their hand, even when it caused the animals great stress—again, thankfully this has changed, too).
READ: Being A Mindful Traveler And A Responsible Local Is The Key To Achieving Sustainable Tourism
6. (Metal) straws are sexy
Here's a bandwagon Iza wants us all to join.
With the advent of environmentally-friendly brands came the rise of the use of metal or bamboo straws, and it's great. Straws, like many plastic containers, bottles, and bags, are single-use items and they do terrible things to the envionment.
By making it a practice to decline straws when unnecessary (soda and juice taste exactly the same without a straw!) and by having a handy-dandy metal or wooden alternative close by, you can definitely be part of the solution to this.
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In the Philippines, WWF-Philippines President and CEO Joel Palma and WWF-Philippines Head of Climate and Energy Program and Earth Hour Pilipinas National Director Atty. Gia Ibay lead the organization's initiatives alongside WWF Ambassadors Iza Calzado, Marc Nelson, and Rovilson Fernandez, its first-ever youth representatives, Janine Gutierrez and Andrei Paras, and its newest partner, the Boy Scouts of the Philippines.
Earth Hour 2019 will be celebrated all over the world on March 30, Saturday, from 8:30pm to 9:30pm.
Until then, heed Iza's advice and work towards a greener, happier planet!
Photos from @missizacalzado @earthourofficial
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