Recently updated on July 25th, 2023 at 04:11 pm
Trees help clean the air we breathe, filter the water we drink, and provide habitat to over 80% of the world’s terrestrial biodiversity. The plight of our forests has been a hot topic for decades; however, despite this, we are seeing the rate of deforestation increase.
Our forests are being cut down around the world at a rate of approximately 1.5 acres per second, the equivalent of about 800 football fields per hour. And, according to The World Bank, between 1990 and 2016, we cut down 1.3 million acres of forest, an area larger than South Africa.
This Earth Month, we want to encourage you to do your part to help stop this rampant destruction of one of our most precious resources: the lungs of the Earth. So, below we’ve put together five simple ways to reduce your paper consumption and help protect the 80,000 acres of forests that disappear from the Earth every day.
5 Easy Ways to Use Less Paper:
1. BYOB (Bring Your Own Bag)
Use your own reusable bag at all the stores you shop at (not just the grocery store) and skip the paper bags. Choosing paper bags over plastic already feels like you’re doing your part for the sustainability movement, but did you know that paper bags produce 70 times more air pollutants and 50 times more water pollutants than plastic bags? Not that environmentally friendly after all.
2. Go paper-free
Change your bills to “paperless” and pay them online or by phone. Not only does this help conserve paper usage, it makes keeping track of your payments a lot simpler. We live in the technology age, why not take advantage of it? At Trafalgar, we have teamed up with One Tree Planted to do our part to reforest the world. For every client that books with our paperless e-documentation system, we plant a tree in their honour. And, thanks to the environmental consciousness of our guests, over 70% choosing to go paper-free, we have been able to reforest 150 acres of forests in Northern California and Tanzania since 2018.
3. Read online
Choose to read the e-versions of magazines, newspapers, books and travel brochures. With e-books, tablets and even apps for your mobile phone, almost every piece of written text is available in electronic form. Many magazines and newspapers also offer discounts for subscribing to their online editions. We offer online versions of all our brochures which can be viewed directly in your browser or downloaded to your computer.
4. KeepCups
Bring your own cup when you’re on the go and avoid single-use paper/plastic cups. With 16 billion paper cups used for coffee every single year, 6.5 million trees are cut down just for this one product. Just one KeepCup can replace up to 1,000+ disposable cups. And, good news, most cafés offer discounts for bringing your own mug. Save money and save the planet!
5. Say no to junk mail
More than 100 million trees are destroyed each year to make junk mail, and 44% never gets opened. Saying no to junk mail is easier than you think. Contact the postal service and place a “no commercial mail” sign on your mailbox. There are also services in most countries that let you opt-out of certain kinds of mailers. Contact your postal service to find out more.
By using less paper, you help save the 28,000 species expected to become extinct in the next 25 years due to deforestation. If you want to know more about preserving the well-being of Mother Earth, check out some useful tips from our Earth Month Ambassador Matt Hill, founder of One Tree Planted. And learn more about how we do our part to make a difference through our JoinTrafalgar program.