The responsibility for reducing waste should not lie with the consumer (Picture: Getty)

Today marks the beginning of Zero Waste Week, an annual campaign to raise awareness, reduce waste and save resources.

With the UK generating around 200million tonnes of waste each year, there’s no doubt that something needs to change. And slowly but surely it is.

Plastic waste in particular has caught our collective attention, with the ‘Blue Planet Effect’ prompting many of us to reconsider our acceptance of single use plastics.

Spurred into action by the heartbreaking images of the harm plastic waste is doing to aquatic life, the effort to reduce human impact shifted from the environmentally conscious fringes to the mainstream. Many of us saw it as our duty to change our habits hoping that, in doing so, we could change the world.




From proposed plastic straw bans and latte levies to zero waste living, the burden for tackling plastic pollution has been laid firmly at the feet of consumers.

I leave the house encumbered by tote bags, organic cotton produce bags, reusable food containers and my bulky stainless steel water bottle.

I haven’t bought a drink in a plastic bottle in years, and when I unwittingly ordered a cup of tea from a stealth ‘to-go only’ coffee shop, I was racked with guilt over the single use cup for days.

My beauty routine, my diet, where I shop, and how I live is shaped by reducing my impact on the planet and I’m not alone.

Shops such as Acala, Atlas and Ortus and Ripple have launched to answer the growing demand for zero waste products. Sustainability lies at the heart of their business model and their customers’ lifestyles.

We’re accepting responsibility and adjusting accordingly. But should we really be the ones taking the blame?

While we suffer from ‘green guilt’, propose taking away vital resources from people living with disabilities and reconstruct our lifestyles around being more environmentally conscious, big businesses are escaping the blame and it suits them just fine.

Coca-Cola, for instance, drew praise in 2017 for creating an advert made entirely from recycled plastic to encourage their customers to recycle their bottles.

Yet as they tasked the general public with taking care of the single use plastic they create in the name of sales, it was revealed that the company had increased its production of plastic bottles by a billion compared to the preceding 12 months.

Similarly, when I took Aldi to task over their plastic-wrapped fruit and veg, they were happy to talk about their zero waste factories, yet wouldn’t offer forth a solution – or accept responsibility – for their post-consumer waste.

As we twist ourselves into knots over straws, coffee cup lids, shopping bags and food packaging, big brands continue to flood our planet with single use plastics. From design to shop floor, they’re responsible for its existence – yet it’s us, right at the very end of the chain, who are expected to clean up their mess.

Plastic products are often significantly cheaper and much more convenient. And for some people, they’re vital.



We only have so much capacity – time-wise, physically, mentally, and financially. At times, we simply have no other choice but to take the cheapest or easiest option and often, that option comes wrapped up in plastic.

Big businesses and global brands, the ones flooding the planet with plastic in the first place, have the power to make loose fruit and veg the cheaper option. They have the space and facilities to provide in-store water fountains instead of shelves full of plastic bottles. They have the budget to fund research and development into fully recyclable packaging. They have the capability to make real, systemic, problem-solving change.

Yes, I’ll do my bit and yes, I’ll make good choices wherever possible, but I won’t take the blame anymore and nor should you. This Zero Waste Week, we need to move the lens and start focusing on the real culprits.

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