Righteo then, here it is. The outcomes of a meeting with Dunshaughlin’s inspired plastic shunners.
Seeing as each of us already had our ideas, we decided to continue the work we had started as individuals, together. Big dreams and baby steps might be the way to go.
EARTH DAY is coming up (April 22nd)! If we are to be serious in our shunning of plastic, we must plan something seriously stunning (because it rhymes). Send in all your ideas! Luke brought the topic up, and it might be a good opportunity for Tidy Towns and Sick of Plastic to share interests.
ALDI is coming to Dunshaughlin! While the impact of this is debatable, we thought we’d do our best to make it positive. It’s not built yet, which means there’s still time for them to include a beautiful plastic free haven for the hippies of this growing town. An exhilarating thought.
We’ll be asking SuperValu and Lidl for their support too. Let’s make it as easy as possible for them to make the switch, starting off with key things like fruit and veg.
Calling all farmers! If you’re willing to grow some organic veggies and skip the packaging step, let us know! We’re hoping to get the supermarket’s support on this one, and they’ll need PLASTIC-FREE SUPPLIERSs. There’s also the option of holding a market every once in a while, and make that zero-waste produce easy to get at. Such an event would require all sorts, so if you have something to offer, do!
In the same bag as routine markets, we thought of hosting a swap day (taking inspiration from the charity Street Feast), where farmers and locals would each bring their own contribution to exchange. Possibly an alliterative name such as ‘Plasticless Picnic in the Park’ could do the job.
DUNSHAUGHLIN’S WATER is not famous for being amazing, and it can sometimes come out brown or full of limescale. Bottled water is well safer, but a long shot away from being eco friendly. There have been rumours of ceramic water filters floating around, we could give it a shot! Filtration is definitely the way to go. What about setting up bottle refill stations in schools or supermarkets? A little food for thought.
The group ‘Sick of Plastic’ is a lot bigger than just Dunshaughlin, and they’ve been working astoundingly hard to get a DEPOSIT AND RETURN SCHEME in Ireland for plastic bottles and aluminium cans. It’s worth having a look at what we can do in our not-so-small-anymore town to help. There’s a business in Navan recycling PET bottles to make dog beds, and Marie’s running a charity called Dogs in Distress. Could we collect bottles for this company, to provide Marie’s charity with eco-friendly dog beds? She’s on to it. Tidy Towns was involved in the programme Every Can Counts in 2016 and 2017, a Europe-wide organisation helping people recycle drink cans. Nice.
That one’s a big movement, but let’s get down and personal. What nature damaging habits do we have? Well, DISPOSABLE COFFEE CUPS and straws, and synthetic body and delph scrubbers are some big ones. What would Dunshaughlin say to locally sourced sustainable versions of these? Reusable coffee cups are fashionable, and you can grow natural scrubbers (called loofahs) easily enough.
A LOOFAH is a wonderful vegetable with a wonderful name that can be used to scrub anything. All we need is a plot of land to grow them on, and they’re ready to be handed out to Dunshaughliners. Fiona’s already finding out more about loofahs, and she’s searching for polytunnel owners with open doors.
How about GOING STRAWLESS altogether? Every person reading, editing or writing this paragraph has, at some point, silently accepted an unwanted straw in their drink and thought “Dammit, they got me again,”. Businesses need to let their straw stock dry out, and we need to let them know that we don’t want the sucky demons. Start handing them back if you didn’t ask for one, and they might get the message.
We thought it’d be nice to DO A SURVEY too. It’s hard to get everyone together in one meeting, but it’s also clear that the people unable to come still want a change. So, what do you want? Which plasticky problems are breaking your heart, and which solutions are you willing to get behind? It’ll all be in there.
We spoke about a lot of things during our meeting on Tuesday. Better yet we came out of it with a few definite goals, and many more brilliant ideas.
Please understand that this is simply a summary of everything we spoke about as a group. You might be able to tell that some of the ideas are under-developed, but that’s why we’re telling you about them. We want your input, your ideas, and your s
Here we go! Thank you to all the wonderful people (and children!) who came along yesterday. We can fairly say that we were overloaded with ideas, and definitely have a few baby steps on the way!
There's lot's more info to come, we'll tell you everything that went on ASAP.
In the photo: Cathy and Liam, Marie, Ailbhe and Dara, Fiona and Luke from TidyTowns. Missing: Sadhbh and Mary
Just to let everyone know, there's now a facebook page up for this group too - just search Dunshaughlin is Sick of Plastic @SickofPlasticDunshaughlin.
It might be a bit easier to keep updated on there, so give it a like!
Thank you all for joining! This page will hopefully be our gateway into a cleaner Dunshaughlin. I believe step one is to share a coffee together, and have a look and what changes we'd like to make.
There are some pretty cool ideas in the resources section of this page, check it out if you get a chance!
Maybe next Tuesday morning or evening? Let me know when you're free, hopefully we can all meet!
