The 27 million South African consumers will spend an average of R1 735 per person this Black Friday, according to Black Friday Global.
Stefan Burrows, co-director and founder of Curbon, is encouraging consumers to be more conscious of the impact their purchases have on the environment, and to take steps to reduce the impact.
According to Burrows, being a conscious consumer and offsetting the carbon emission of what is being purchased, will add between 2% and 5% to the purchase cost of a consumer.
Online vs traditional
On average, online shopping has 17% lower carbon emissions in comparison to the traditional brick-and-mortar way of shopping.
Burrows said that 17% less does not mean there is no impact on the environment due to the emissions involved in manufacturing of goods.
“From packaging to warehousing and delivery emissions, every product we buy has an environmental price tag – but as of now, there is something we can do about it,” Burrows said.
Reducing carbon emissions
According to Burrow, there are number of ways that online and brick-and-mortar retailers as well as consumers can reduce the impact on the environment.
These include:
– Reducing the emissions of their products and their entire value chain.
– E-commerce retailers can offer sustainable shopping solutions like carbon offsetting, which will direct funds towards climate change projects to cut down on the emissions of a customer’s purchase.
– Consumers can do their part for sustainability by choosing brands that use locally sourced materials and offer carbon offsetting solutions.
Fast consumerism and the consequences
Burrows said the demand of fast consumerism has created production practices that favour constant product iterations and upgrades within smaller time frames.
“Fast Fashion companies alone generate more pollution than international aviation and shipping combined and use around 93m³ billion of water each year,” Burrows said.
Climate scientists are calling for people to curb human-caused emissions that can have an impact climate change.
People are on a deadline which means waiting for companies to reduce their carbon emissions is not feasible, Burrows said.
He said consumers have the power to start curbing the effect their purchases have on the environment through carbon offsetting.
“If only 20% of South Africans contribute 2% of the value of their online carts towards carbon offsetting their purchases, R150 million would be raised for climate change projects annually,” Burrows said.
IOL Business