Although I respect her talent as a writer, I was shocked to read columnist Deborah Hill Cone's article this week, in which she complains about a policy of her children's school lunches being free of single-use plastic.
The point of asking parents to provide food without wrappers, is not for them to unwrap the expensive, processed food that they bring home in a disposable plastic bag weekly and send to landfill via their overflowing bin. Really the goal is to provide healthy, fresh food that doesn't need plastic wrapped around it in the first place.
In my day job I get to visit hundreds of schools and actively encourage plastic-free lunches not as a measure to teach kids, but to teach their parents that convenient consumables leave an unwanted legacy to the detriment of future generations.
Parents choose what goes in the lunch and while the most stubborn ones may not listen to me, if kids continually pester mum and dad because they are embarrassed to finish lunch with a fistful of worthless plastic, then even the most stoic consumers are likely to relent.
Through a targeted approach, the younger generation and their increasingly loud voice become the secret weapons in reducing household waste.