Who We Are
Welcome to Waste Action Maleny (WAM)!
We are a non-profit community group focused on developing and supporting a range of initiatives to inform, educate and empower local people to find local solutions to the global problem of waste and its many related issues. We are based in Maleny, Sunshine Coast, Queensland, Australia.
Our aim is to work together to contribute to a healthy, sustainable environment and a liveable future for our children and all living things by:
- rethinking – perhaps it’s time for all of us to think about how we live our lives in relation to our impact on the planet, and on local and global ecosystems. In particular, around our personal waste contribution, with its resulting pollution of air, water and land, dispersal of toxic chemicals, the decompostion of plastics and other discarded materials that then enter the food chain, and carbon and greenhouse gas emissions feeding the climate crisis, among other consequences. Do we really need all the stuff we buy? Can we afford the real cost? The choices we make today will affect the future we all will face in the coming years.
- reducing – this is really important. If we can we reduce the amount of stuff we buy, that will in turn reduce the amount of waste we create, thereby reducing the amount of stuff that goes to landfill or that needs to be produced in the first place.
- repairing – if a thing stops working or gets damaged or broken, can it be fixed? If so, it will save money by eliminating the need to replace it, as well as becoming one less thing to manufacture and one less thing to end up in landfill.
- reusing – if we no longer need a thing, can it be reused by someone else? If you need something, do you need to buy new, or can you reuse something that someone else is discarding or reselling? Can it be shared, borrowed or traded?
- recycling – if an item has come to the end of its useful life, and if it can’t be fixed or reused, can it be recycled? If not, why not? If so, where should it go?
Taking these steps, talking about them with friends and family, and taking personal responsibility for our actions can and will make a difference.
Would you like to get involved or learn more? We can use all the help we can get with current and upcoming projects and would welcome your participation. Please join us!
If you are interested in becoming involved you can:
- subscribe to our mailing list and get notifications about upcoming activities by clicking the ‘Subscribe’ button at the top or bottom of this page
- join our facebook group here
- or contact us by email us at wasteactionmaleny@gmail.com
We look forward to resuming in-person meetings in the future. Please see our news and projects pages on this site for information about upcoming events and activities.
A thought: the Earth is the only place in the universe that we know of that supports life. So let’s not trash it. As we’ve been hearing lately, there is no Planet B.