A conference with an intriguing title, “Discarding the Discarded,” organized by Ecoloppiano in its usual Citadel event. An opportunity to reflect on waste and move towards a significant reduction of it, starting with plastic. Thus, some new initiatives get underway.
Let’s limit ourselves to just plastics and the sea. Every year the world’s population spills 10 million tons of plastics into the oceans. The cause is the massive use of packaging and single-use products. We in the West use 100 kilograms of it per person per year, with the aggravating factor that only 40 percent makes it to landfills, and the rest pollutes. Plastic is the sea’s worst enemy, and it is backfiring on us. This, in fact, degrades over time and its nanoparticles are breathed in and ingested by the fish that we then eat, they settle on the seabed, and enter the water cycle that we drink.
“The challenge is the timing!” scientists and experts have been warning for years now. “We must act now!” add leaders of conservation organizations. And one and the other tell us all that “you are mistaken if you say: ‘It’s not our fault.'” We are, in fact, accomplices – with our lifestyles and established daily personal choices – of the greatest environmental disaster in history.
Deliberately blunt was the opening of the conference held at the Auditorium on Sunday, Oct. 2, the date chosen to celebrate Creation Day in the citadel. . The film “On the Side of the Sea” by Francesco Malingri proved to be a salutary “blow on the head” to gain greater awareness. “The hailed limitless development has not been subjected to criticism, so we are now in danger of being at the beginning of an agony for the planet and all beings,” pointed out Rossano Ercolini, who was awarded the 2013 Goldman Environmental Prize, , known as the alternative Nobel Prize for the environment, founder of “Rifiuti Zero” (Zero Waste), an initiative involving 330 Italian municipalities.
Politics and Waste
“We must choose the path of zero waste,” Ercolini indicated in his impassioned video conference speech, “so as to regenerate resources. And he explained, “Garbage bins are urban deposits from which we can extract many valuable materials. The European Union would have come out of the economic crisis if it had developed waste recovery.”».
Economist Luigino Bruni, a historian of economic thought, goes right to the point: “We cannot wait for summits among the political leaders of the world, but must act now. Capitalism has led to the destruction of the common home.” “A real ecological transition requires a paradigm shift in our choices, even as consumers.” Bruni places trust in the younger generation. “On ecology, the young people are ahead of us adults. There is an authentic youth magisterium on the environment and adults are called to listen, . without paternalistic attitudes.”
Some good practices in the citadel
The now traditional annual meeting on creation in the citadel, organized by Ecoloppiano, was entitled “Let’s Discard the Discarded,” with the aim of entering into the discarded and seeing it as a resource and no longer as a problem. An outdoor Mass near St. Benedict Hall, with an effective homily by Franciscan Fr. Theo, closed a morning of work amid the nature of the Laudato Si’ Ring.
Recovery processes initiated at Loppiano were discussed in the second part of the conference. Good practices, starting with the recovery of copper in electrical cables or the recovery of aluminum cans or iron cans, crushed with a special press and resold to specialized companies. Computers are also disassembled and valuable materials in the boards are recovered. All this, at a collection point, which Ecoloppiano wants to upgrade with the help of all residents.
Another initiative is “Il Fagotto,” (The Bundle) located at Bonfanti Industrial Park, a pleasant exchange environment for clothing, footwear, household items and more. This is an opportunity for a growing audience, a place to fight against speculation and the false myth of brands. A forerunner of the discarded and its recovery into a work of art is Roberto Cipollone, aka Ciro. In his 55 years in Loppiano he has created an original style, and the post-pandemic revival of exhibitions of his objects are demonstrating public appreciation.
Turning Smart and Panda cars into electric instead of gasoline engines is the business of entrepreneur Luciano Battaini, who came to the citadel for the first time. It all started with a bicycle that was about to be scrapped and then transformed, equipping it with pedal assist.
Future Plans
The “Discard the Discarded” event was in the intentions of the organizers also a starting point. Thus, a distribution point for liquid detergents using their own plastic containers will be opened in the citadel for the first time, so as to reduce the production of the latter. The focolarine residing in six apartments in Villa Eletto have adopted a “Zero Waste” lifestyle based on five Rs: Refuse plastic packaging, Reduce energy consumption, Reuse, Recycle, Reduce organic waste into Compost. Finally, Loreto School families organized themselves as a solidarity buying group, purchasing seasonal vegetables and fruits from a nearby organic farm. The next appointment when we can reflect together as a citadel on climate change and the behaviors that we can acquire will take place on November 4, 2022.