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 Environ-Mental
We as "86's" (those who were born in 1986) have not faced the tremendous change happening all around us. Although the military coup of 1980 did not touch us, or the Two World Wars, we face what could be the most significant environmental challenges that have ever come before. Honestly, this article has nothing to do with the famous cliché, "Being a child at the end of the 80's and at the beginning of the 90's." What I want to say is a bit different and has been on my mind for a while after a friend of mine forwarded me an e-mail with a presentation she had done. It just so happens that a semester ago, I was at another English course presentation made by one of my dearest classmates talking about the same subject (Now I realize how presenting my friends are!).
The issue is plastic bags. Can you believe that one trillion plastic bags are used each year throughout the world? Sadly, the recycling rate is only one percent, mainly because the cost of recycling bags is very high compared to the cost of producing new ones! That means 99,000,000,000 bags end up in the trash! I'm tired just from writing all of those zeros! Where is all this trash going? Nope, the landfill is not the correct answer. It is the sea! An investigation done in 1975 showed that ships throw 3,700,000 kilograms into the seas, turning sea bottoms into landfills, causing harm to animals, humans and nature! Very impressive photographs and numbers are available in the presentation that was sent to me. If you are interested I can send it to you by e-mail.
Now, here comes the solution: If one person out of five in Turkey were to use cloth bags instead of plastic ones, during a lifespan, 31,046,400,000 plastic bags would be taken out of circulation. Countries like Bangladesh, China, Ireland, Canada, South Africa and others have either strictly prohibited the use of plastic bags, or have made strong regulations to decrease their usage. I won't say that Turkey should do the same and take action immediately. I hate being unrealistic. But, I try to find people who are willing to be that one out of five, and I become very optimistic.
As students, another issue is even closer to us: paper usage. At the end of each semester, I have collected a huge amount of paper, usually print outs from labs that have only been used on one side. I have tried to use the other side as work sheets, but the amount was so huge that I couldn't even use a quarter of it. Why can't we use the other side of white paper when printing at the labs? Why don't they load the printers with this perfectly good partly used paper? It would be far better than the current situation. Of course, professors could support this by declaring that they would accept homework or reports printed on the back of paper that has already been used once. Maybe extra bonuses may even work in here. Extra bonuses may even work here; I know this sounds optimistic, but the idea behind it is so valuable in fact. Sounds reasonable, doesn't it?
Özlem Erdem (IE/IV)
oerdem@ug.bilkent.edu.tr
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