Christmas in the Philippines start really early. Can you imagine hearing Christmas songs playing in the malls in September? Yep! When the “ber” months arrive here, it means it is the start of Christmas. The malls have their reason to do this: to encourage people to buy, buy, buy!
It’s difficult to believe that Philippines is a poor country is you go to the malls during a 3-day-weekend sale especially these days. The malls are cramped with people: families, group of friends, employees out from offices. . .you’ll see them with bags of groceries, clothes, food, and gifts.
Because we buy a lot during Christmas, it is the time of the year that is the least environmentally-friendly. Why? Because, the more we buy, the more we’re using earth’s resources.
The more food we buy, the more plastic bags we use, the more waste will go to our dump sites, the more cans, bottles and plastic containers will be used. . .
The more clothes we buy, the more energy is needed to manufacture more of them, the more water is needed to wash them,the more electricity is used to iron them out.
The more gifts that we buy, the more paper is needed for the gift wrappers, more gifts will have to be manufactured to replace our gifts for next year, the more waste we’ll have for broken toys and electronic gadgets
How can we make our Philippine Christmas green? Reduce our buying. Instead of buying, why not just give our time and energy to our family and friends? Will Christmas not be as meaningful if we don’t have 5 pairs of new pants?
If we reduce our consumption of manufactured goods and use more eco-friendly alternatives, we will be helping a lot already and we are already prolonging the stay of our species here on earth.
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