Volunteer Reflection
Introduction
The focus of community projects is to provide a long-term impact to people and community. This is usually achieved by creation of an environment that is beneficial and an economical society that meets the economical and social needs of the people. A community that is sustainable has availability of resources enough job opportunities, high quality lives, well improved infrastructure and a well improved natural resources management. It is important for one to attend volunteer groups as they impact adequate knowledge concerning the environment and importance of proper waste management. The aim of this paper is to bring out discussion of researched environmental issue during the project in the community, sustainability area, the available challenges and the stakeholders who are supposed to address the issue. Proper waste management enables the community to live healthy.
Environmental Issue
The environmental issue that has been leading to negative implication to the community and people is disposal of waste. This issue has been affecting the businesses, the health of human beings as well as the environment. I had participated in Zero Waste Networks New Zealand, a movement that had been involved in enhancing proper waste disposal. This took place between second and eighth of the month of April. My volunteerism had averagely taken a period of one week where I got an opportunity to engage in various activities that the group participates in. The activities mostly performed by this particular movement include; offering support to organizations in the community businesses, councils, individual and schools involved in minimization of waste management and recycling (Anna, 2016). Additional to the activities of this group is that it has been in the position to enhance participation of authorities of South Island to adopt the policies of the group.
It is clear that technology has been improving at a high rate but the issue of waste disposal has always remained unsolved. This issue needs immediate actions in order to lower the possibility of negative implications that might turn out to being threats to the future generations. Basing the focus on setting, the area has a high population with abundant industries, large scale and small scale businesses (Harrison, 2013). There are also governmental as well as non-governmental organizations. It should be noted that the population growth as well as that of the businesses has been facilitating towards this issue of waste disposal. The community and the business are involved in environmental waste disposal of solid items. This has lead to contamination of ground and surface water contamination, release of gases known to be harmful like methane and bad odor. There is also release of toxins that usually affects sol and water thereby harming the human health (Kolb, 2008). From research carried out by Zero Waste Network New Zealand, it has been found that solid waste disposal has been facilitated by lack of disposal and waste collection systems, uncontrolled sites of damping and the activities of recycling the wastes. There is also lack of modernized facilities of modern waste treatment and poor management of wastes by the local authorities.
Tasks Addressed by Zero Waste Networks New Zealand
There are various tasks that were being addressed by the group. These include corporate reporting which is mandatory, packaging levy, linking of the campaign of national Zero Waste communication, minimum standards of recycled content, job investments through reusing, recycling and reprocessing items locally and plastic bag levies (Anna, 2016). There is also public sector Green procurement guidelines, measurement, monitoring and national reporting on Zero Waste journey.
Area of Sustainability
Waste management is the practice of collection, transportation, processing and disposal of waste. It is also involves management and monitoring of waste materials. It is essential to observe this step so that waste can be well managed efficiently instead of being disposed on the land. Waste can be minimized by recycling and reusing of items. Waste generation reduction can also assist in minimizing the waste by protection of dwelling resources, reduction of contamination and pollution and reducing the community targets of waste minimization. In order to get this achievement, there is the need to change views on waste management and its importance in life. Different communities have assumed different routes which are being directed to achievement of Zero Waste (Gillespie, 2015). This is good as there are different variables to be put in consideration in each district and region. The issue of waste has become a community thing. This gives implies that all community members are supposed to take part in the available links established to manage the environmental waste. Participation of people involved in manufacturing activities is expected to take part in the waste management strategy.
There are various ways of creating an efficient plan of waste management. To begin with, there is consideration of management of sustainable materials. It is advisable not to assume that managing waste is the last step one can do but rather sustainable waste management approach should be considered (Chang & Pires, 2015). The step of waste management requires one to bring into sense the aspect of recycling as well, as reusing the waste. The later step allows one to carry out informed and deliberate decisions concerning the right ways in which the flow of waste materials should assume at different stages of manufacture. The aim of this step is to minimize the amount of wastes that is generated at last. The other way is planning of the waste at every stage and helps one to achieve their objectives as far as waste disposal is concerned. One should follow the plan at all stages. When the significant strategic steps have been put in place, deliverance of improvement considered to be sustainable is achieved
The issue of collaboration with different companies and organizations is very essential as far as waste disposal is concerned. The companies should be sharing similar goals in waste management. One approach in self-supporting and sustainable partnership between local governments and various businesses is Private-Public Partnership for Service Delivery (Robinson, 2010). Such collaboration helps in establishment of improved relationship public, private and citizen stakeholders. The cooperation also helps in limiting adverse effects of wastes materials in the poor communities. It also facilitates to improved waste management and recycling methods as well as improvement of businesses and the lives people. The last way is paying focus on avoidance of landfills. It is important to avoid activities that facilitate to landfills as much as one can. It is necessary for the civil bodies to carry operations under legislative requirements that aim to achieve given diversion goals
Business Involvement in Waste Management and Challenges Likely to be faced in Future
There is the knowledge for the need to carefully dispose waste by the business. The small and medium entrepreneurship faces much pressure when dealing with waste materials. This is because they have a challenge of insufficiency of the necessary expertise or resources. There is also a challenge of destruction of many reusable and recyclable items by scavengers as they seek components and high value metals. Involvement of business can be achieved through empowerment of people in order to notify them that they can bring defense by making the correct choices when buying products and services in New Zealand and other areas. This can happen when people decide to purchase products which recycled content, purchase second hand items, select goods with minimal packaging, implement their power of purchase in order to give support to the economy (De & Perry, 2012). People can also repair items instead of throwing them away, purchase products with quality that can be repaired and demand deduction on unnecessary stuffs. Adoption of Green procurement guidelines by business sectors is important. This would enable the council departments adopt policies in purchases that favor materials and products that contain recyclable contents. There is the probability of businesses being unable to offer supplies to the local council with superior products regardless the presence of environmental policies.
The online business could give opportunities for small and medium entrepreneurships that are in need to dispose waste or come up with waste management services. They could also provide opportunities for small and medium entrepreneurships who dispose the waste themselves (Cruz-Cunha & Varajao, 2011). This could be achieved by proposing an approach for location of actors who are to be involved in transporting, disposing, recycling and reusing the wastes. There is incorporation of the author’s approach of Request Based Virtual Organizations by use of Service Oriented Architecture. There is also incorporation of ontology for defining the requirements of waste management. There is utilization of the Multi-Agent System involved in negotiations and formation of Request Based Virtual Organizations. It is this approach that enables the small and medium entrepreneurships to get partners who are appropriate handle the issue of waste management and achieve advantageous competition in the market.
Volunteering is Important
There is also generation of new jobs resulting from implementation of new policies of Zero Waste. This is because resource recovery and recycling create jobs than land filling activities. According to the report given by Grass Roots Recycling Networks, wasting and recycling puts United States of America in a position to create many jobs more than incineration or land filling (White & Duram, 2013). This has been increasing with time. Volunteering in special events like being a team member of a group that is promoting importance of responsible waste management for Green Fest or Mindful Metropolis would enable one to get rewards on their activities. It would also play an important role in eating the best delicious food and attending various music events (Information Resources Management Association, 2017). One would also be in a position to see documentaries. Other organizations can enable the learners to know about climatic issues thereby expanding their environmental knowledge. These organizations educate the public on the importance of participating in environmental issues and being participants of in the same. This shows that one should participate in volunteer movements as they create opportunities to get knowledge concerning the environment.
Conclusion
Waste disposal has been a major environmental issue calling for attention. Many negative implications have been associated with associated with poor waste disposal. This has been caused by both private and public activities. Harmful impacts on health as well as environment are associated with poor waste disposal as seen in the discussion above. Area of sustainability involves the management of waste products without necessarily compromising the future. Reusing and waste generation reduction can are some of the ways to assist in minimizing the waste by protection of dwelling resources, reduction of contamination and pollution and reducing the community targets of waste minimization. Use of recyclable items should be encouraged as this would play an important role in reducing environmental pollution. Participation in volunteer groups creates ways to job opportunities as seen in the paper above. There are various tasks addressed by the Zero Waste Networks New Zealand and the there has been the view of waste disposal as a community issue. There is also proposal of an approach for location of actors who are to be involved in transporting, disposing, recycling and reusing the wastes. As the business gets involved, it faces pressure in disposal of waste. Inability to offer to oiffer supplies to the local council with superior products regardless the presence of environmental policies is one among other challenges that business would face in future as aresult of participation in Zero Waste Network. Proper waste management enables the community to live healthy.
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Reference
Anna R. Davies. (2016).The Geographies of Garbage Governance: Interventions, Interactions and Outcomes. Routledge.
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Chang, N.-B., & Pires, A. (2015). Sustainable solid waste management: A systems engineering approach.Hoboken, New Jersey : John Wiley & Sons Inc., [Piscataqay, New Jersey]
Cruz-Cunha, M. M., & Varajao, J. (2011). E-business issues, challenges and opportunities for
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Gillespie, A. (2015). Waste policy: International regulation, comparative and contextual perspectives. Cheltenham : Edward Elgar Pub. Ltd.,
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Information Resources Management Association, (2017). Natural resources management: Concepts, methodologies, tools, and applications.
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Kolb, R. W. (2008). Encyclopedia of business ethics and society. Thousand Oaks: Sage Publications.
Robinson, H. (2010). Governance & knowledge management for public-private partnerships. Chichester, U.K: Wiley-Blackwell.
White, K. K., & Duram, L. A. (2013). America goes green: An encyclopedia of eco-friendly culture in the United States.
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