The Garbage Problems in Our Society

With garbage comes pollution and unlike other animals, humans cannot keep up with their waste. The problem of trash production has been around for ages, but has continued to be ignored by the population. Working in the restaurant business, living in an urban area for most of my life, and going to school regularly, I have seen firsthand just how bad this issue is getting. As the world population increases, we need to step up our game and take the right precautions and spread awareness to help our home and secure life for future generations.

I have been working in the restaurant business since I was fifteen. People go out to restaurants for special occasions or to have a good cooked meal. But what happens to that piece of chicken that you didn’t finish? Or the little wooden umbrella that was in your Mai Tai? For the past five years being a server, I have thrown out countless unfinished meals, napkins, straws, bottles and other goods. Glasses and plates are broken repeatedly, swept up, and thrown away. Nothing is recycled, trash bags are changed several times every shift, thrown into the dumpster never to be thought about again. While chefs are preparing food, they are throwing away pieces of meat they do not need and other scraps of food that has no use to them. The amount of garbage waste that is generated in restaurants is unacceptable. There are simple ways to address this issue and make changes to help fix the fate of our planet. Restaurants need to step up and start recycling glass, paper, plastic, cardboard and other recyclable items. When preparing food, instead of throwing away the scraps you don’t need, you could use them for something else or even donate. Little changes can make a huge difference if everyone puts in the effort.

Restaurants aren’t the only places that generate waste. Urban communities like the one I live in also have some things to work on. Living near a corner store can be useful, but I have noticed when people are walking home from the store, scratching a scratch ticket or eating a bag of chips, instead of holding on to their garbage and throwing it away when they reach their destination, they will toss their trash underneath my front bushes or onto my front lawn. All this waste builds up and I try to clean up once a month. Sometimes, it takes three or four trash bags to pick up all the trash. This is avoidable, but people are oblivious about the waste problem we have so are careless. More trash cans could be placed on the streets to prevent the buildup of trash in neighborhoods. To add to the waste on my front lawn, my family are not the eco-friendliest people. At our home, we overuse paper plates and bottled waters. Whenever we have breakfast, lunch, dinner or even a snack we eat off of paper plates. We buy about three packs of bottled waters weekly and each water is rarely finished. To make this issue worse, we do not recycle and throw these things straight into the trash. These problems can be easily resolved. Glass plates can be washed and reused along with refillable water bottles. Little efforts like these could make a huge difference.

Sometimes, students spend more time at school then they do at home. Cramming for exams, staying up all night to finish essays, and countless assignments leads tocoffee cups, straws, and fast food bags. All of which can be recycled, reused, or even sometimes are not even necessary. I have noticed at my college that there are not nearly enough trash cans or recycle bins for the number of students that attend the school. Because of this, pieces of trash are found in the parking lot and around campus. Students should be encouraged to use reusable coffee cups to prevent using plastic straws to help the littering problem. Another waste that I have noticed generated around my school are paper towels. When entering the bathroom, paper towels are thrown all over the floor and counters. To save the janitors and the environment some trouble, schools should install electronic hand dryers and not give the option of paper towels in bathrooms. This will prevent people from overusing these goods and will keep the bathrooms cleaner for everyone to use. Taking care of our home is very important. All of our waste is being taken to a way to landfills where they are either burned or buried and later will come back to haunt us. The pollution caused by garbage is a major problem in the world that could result in major health, space, and economic issues. Increasing volumes of waste could result in shrinking of living space or even disease. It is our duty to make sure our earth is livable for future generations and to keep our home healthy.