The reason why I choose the topic global warming is I have seen some news about recently Antarctic temperature rises which leads to negative impacts on biology and the environment. Every time I hear news of environmental degradation, it breaks my heart, so I wanted to make some changes that would have a real positive impact on life.
I think many people see protecting the environment as a duty, I want to change it into a lifestyle.
I set the stakeholders as young people between 18-30 years old in China who love to share on social networks.
I choose China because compared with the western developed countries, China generally has not begun to pay attention to the issue of environmental protection. Moreover, I have a better understanding of Chinese people’s living habits and it is more convenient for me to interview specific audiences. I choose young people of a similar generation to me because they are more willing to accept and learn new things.
My research area is about a big concept “zero waste”, which means how to minimize waste in daily life.
My first step is look at my trash, and understand what it is, then I found I have 3 main sources of trash: Food packaging, Product packaging and Clothing waste. Then I made a questionnaire and interviewed 30 young people in between 20 and 30 years old about what is their main waste sources, got almost the same results.
I wanted to design a new product to replace the consumables, when I decided the topic was to protect the environment. After this research I realized that if I designed, produced and sold some new eco-friendly products, which also cause unnecessary waste. The most fundamental solution is to reduce the consumption of goods and reduce the waste of packaging which means we will not produce any trash.
There are already many tutorials on the Internet about how to DIY household products like beeswax or soap. I think the key difference is motivation, how to make people willing to do it and share the experiences and influence more people around them Which can make the balance between the economic, social and environmental aspects of our lives.
Social networks are influencing people’s lives potentially, and many young people want to express themselves through Instagram, such as vegetarianism or love of fitness, there are kind of modern trends. I want zero waste lifestyle to become a new trend like them, people are willing to do this and post on social networks to achieve the goal of change.
Different social platforms will attract users of different ages and preferences. After my research, I chose a social platform called REDBOOK in China, which is mainly used by women. It mainly shares lifestyle, including cooking, dressing, beauty makeup and fitness.
I also found an NGO called ZERO WASTE EUROPE which work on a wide range of projects and policy areas with the single objective of advancing the zero waste future for Europe. I sent an email to the office to apply for the design related volunteers, hoping to carry out some cooperation. No reply has been received yet due to corona situation.