Most people know that recycling is important in order to make less of an impact upon the environment however there are a lot of people that ignore this and fail to recycle the things that can be recycled!
Which has made me think about why people recycle stuff and what motivates them to do so? In some parts of the US they get paid to recycle but here in the UK it is to and is rather expected of us, could this have made a stigma about throwing away recyclables?
If this is the case then maybe paying people to recycle is doing more harm than good? A report by the “EPA” (Environment Protection Agency) done in 2009 for America reported that 34.5% of metals were recycled which means a massive 65.5% of metals that could be reused are just sitting in a land fill! If you wish to see how your state compares then visit: http://www.epa.gov/epahome/whereyoulive.htm
When I ask myself why I recycle the main reason that I can think of is that it is expected of me by the society and culture that I live in. In secondary school for example (for people outside UK it is age group of about 12 – 17) there were big blue recycling bin for cans and bottles and even in the classrooms themselves there were three different recycling boxes (paper, cans and bottles).
Feel free to comment on why you think you and people around you recycle/don’t recycle.
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