Our commitment to planet Earth

Nowadays everybody is an environmental expert....almost everyone knows about pollution, global warming, climate change, carbon footprint, waste minimization etc. which made Al Gore the most popular environmentalist this century....but talking is one thing and doing is another and its the 'doing' part that can make the change happen.

So ever thought what you do at home to reduce your impacts on the fragile environment of this third planet from the Sun??? Or you don't care???

As for us, these are more than a dozen things that we do to contribute to environmental protection and conservation;

1. We reduce waste that goes to the garbage truck (evetually to landfill) by seggregating our wastes which are recycleables (plastic, glass & metal containers, bottles, aluminium cans). We clean them and store them in plastic boxes before sending them to recycle center once the containers are full, probably once in 2 or 3 weeks. We don't normally sell these items.

2. We sell our used newspapers (we have lots of newspapers since we normally read more than 2 newspapers, just to get a more balance picture of a report / story).

3. We turned our kitchen waste into compost as fertilizers for our potted plants.

4. We plant lots of trees to act as dust and noise barriers, reduce impacts of rain on top soil as well as supply oxygen and absorb carbon dioxide.

5. We used high efficiency light bulbs in all our main lights (the ones that we use everyday) and we use dual flush system in our toilets.

6. We stick reminders to conserve power at switches and plugs.

7. We monitor our water and power consumption in order to identify abnormal trends which we can then address.

8. We bring our own shopping bags whenever we shop for our ration and groceries.

9. We donate used clothings, shoes and books for needy people in local community or back in kampung.

10. We try as much as possible to spend holidays locally as air travel affects the environment even worse. Furthermore, local tourism helps local economy.

11. We maintain our cars as per constructors specification. This certainly helps ensure efficiency of our travel and fuel consumption.

12. We make a point to clean our picnic area and its immedaite surrounding whenever we go for a picnic. Plastic really irritates me when they are lying useless.

13. We donate / contribute to or take part in environmental conservation programs including sponsoring/conducting awareness programs for schools.

14. We educate our children about recycling, climate change and environment through sources from internet, national geography magazines and books. We watched the "Inconvenient Truth" documentary by Al Gore and read his book "Our Choice".



Those are our contributions to help mother Earth and I'm sure many other people do more than what we've done, nevertheless it is important that each one of us contribute.

If you don't care, think again....being kind to mother Earth is certainly good Islamic practice.