The power of green purchasing
Key considerations when green purchasing include whether the product you're buying contains recycled content, whether there are energy and water savings, as well as how efficiently the materials were used to make the product. You can also find out whether the manufacturers have product stewardship or waste reduction programs.
The first step in green purchasing is to ask, "Do we need to purchase this item or is there an alternative?" which is the crux of reducing how much waste you produce.
Buying a product made from recycled content is a key consideration for a number of reasons. For recycling to truly be effective, there needs to be strong markets for collected recyclable materials. That is, the collectors need to be able to sell recyclables to manufacturers otherwise recycling is not a viable business.
Buying recycled stimulates these markets because it sends a clear message to manufacturers and retailers that there is demand for recycled content products. When we buy recycled, we 'close the loop' because materials have been used, recycled and used again in new products.
Search Sustainability Victoria's Waste Wise Shopping Guide (see link at bottom of page) for information about where to buy recycled content products.
For Victoria to achieve its waste reduction and avoidance targets, it is essential to develop strong markets for recycled materials through green purchasing.
It is estimated that the amount of resources recovered from the waste stream for recycling will grow from approximately 4 million tonnes in 2001-02 to around 8 million tonnes in 2013. The types of materials to be recovered include food and garden waste, timber, plastic and construction materials. In turn, there needs to be demand from consumers for products using these recovered materials.
Green purchasing, especially for recycled-content, is in its early days. Victorian local government has led the way in stimulating demand for recycled and environmentally preferred products through ECO-Buy.
ECO-Buy works with the Victorian and local government as well as business to encourage purchasing of green products, i.e. products that are less damaging to our environment and human health.
Through this program, significant inroads have been made into changing purchasing policies and practice in member councils.
