The St. Louis Earth Day festival that will take place this weekend in Forest Park is considered the largest in the Midwest.
As St. Louisans celebrate the planet, some may wonder how they can help take action to protect the environment on an individual level. Jess Watson, executive director of earthday365, says there are plenty of easy ways that people can individually work to change the environment, like composting, and simply eating the food that you buy.
"Food waste is something that is actually a major driver of climate change," Watson said. "Eight to ten percent of all greenhouse gas emissions come from food waste, and in our individual households here in America, we waste 40 percent of the food that enters our households."
How about recycling? Many St. Louisans have been upset with the way recycling has been handled in their neighborhoods — the city cut off services in 2021 and brought them back in 2022, but many residents said their recycling was being picked up with their trash anyway. Watson understands many city residents are frustrated with the way it's handled. She said it's in part due to a driver shortage, but it's also on residents themselves.
"There's confusion about what you can put in a recycling dumpster, and so many, many times people put in plastic bags or other things that end up contaminating the whole load," she said. "And so if the worker looks and sees that it's contaminated, then it has to be mixed in with all the trash."
Watson recommends city recyclers use one of the 30 drop stations on the city's recycling website. But even then, she said, when it comes to sustainability, sometimes the "reduce and reuse" advice is even more effective than recycling.
"That's really the most important piece," she said. "We try to emphasize thinking about reuse instead, and thinking from the very beginning at the point of purchase and trying to design systems in your life so that you're not generating that waste in the first place."
The Earth Day festival takes place on Saturday and Sunday this weekend at the Muny grounds. It's free to attend and includes live music, entertainment for kids, wild bird shows, yoga and more than 200 vendors.
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