Changing people’s recycling habits can take many years, since people havedifferent “levels of greenness”. According to the article, “Are all consumers ready to ‘gogreen’?”, people have different attitudes about both their desire and needto become more environmentally concerned and aware.
Many states and cities are launching recycling campaigns to help educateconsumers about the importance of recycling – and to create awareness of theimportance of recycling.
Some of the tools used for these go green campaigns are televisioncommercials, billboard ad, radio commercials and eco-friendly promotionalproducts–given out to school children during community outreach programs.
But not all campaigns are as effective as possible. How do individual statesrank in respect to their recycling efforts? According to the report, “DoMess With It“, by Steve Spacek, residentsof many Northeastern states do the best job of recycling, as they had the leastamount of per capita waste disposal.
Here is the entire list, in order of the state with the least amount ofwaste to the most wasteful state. The number beside the state’s name representsthe daily per capita waste thrown away in pounds, according to 2002numbers.
1.Connecticut 0.4510 2.Vermont 0.5840 3. Maine 1.0348 4.Massachusetts 1.4575 5. New York 1.5250 6. New Jersey 2.4698 7Minnesota 2.5871 8. Maryland 2.9465 9. Hawaii 3.6754 10. Idaho 4.4523 11.Missouri 4.6106 12. Washington 4.9711 13. Florida 5.2001 14.South Dakota 5.3127 15. Montana 5.3165 16. Alaska 5.4872 17.Alabama 6.1666 18. Louisiana 6.2151 19. Delaware 6.2535 20.West Virginia 6.3716 21. Iowa 6.4104 22. Rhode Island 6.664623. Georgia 6.6713 24. California 6.7999 25. Nebraska 6.807226. Oklahoma 6.9690 27. Wyoming 7.2168 28. Texas 7.2457 29.New Hampshire 7.3430 30. North Carolina 7.4116 31. Arkansas 7.5971 32. Mississippi 7.8556 33. Colorado 7.9048 34.Tennessee 8.2213 35. Illinois 8.4773 36. Ohio 8.7336 37. Utah 8.8063 38. Kansas 8.9314 39. Arizona 8.9871 40. Virginia 9.0122 41. Oregon 9.0161 42. Wisconsin 9.4417 43. NorthDakota 9.4650 44. Indiana 9.7873 45. Kentucky 9.9515 46.SouthCarolina 10.2101 47. Michigan 10.4388 48. Pennsylvania 12.9517 49.New Mexico 15.6367 50. Nevada 16.9415
If states and cities can aim for a reasonable annual reduction rate, say 10%per year, and continue their outreach programs despite budget limitations, ahigher level of participation will certainly be achieved.
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Robert Piller, experienced in green marketing campaigns andenvironmentally-friendly promotionalproducts. His web site includes a comprehensive eco-friendly advertisingspecialty search, featuring over 250,000 eco promotional items in all priceranges, for anyone interested in going green. The site’s handy search toolhelps you easily find recyclable, biodegradable, organic or recycled imprintedpromotional items in your price range and time frame. View the Go Green websiteat EcoMarketingSolutions.com and comment on his blog postings atGreenSpotBlog.com.