Yum Cha Chats: Jauz's 5 easy hacks for sustainable living

Perfectly synced to celebrate Earth Day, ‘Oceans and Galaxies’ is Jauz’s latest single together with singer-songwriter HALIENE which dropped just less than ten days ago. To kick off the Earth Day weekend, both Jauz and HALIENE took over Monstercat’s Twitch to raise funds for ocean conservation foundation Beneath The Waves with an acoustic performance to premiere ‘Oceans and Galaxies’. Check out the original track here.

While Mixmag Asia is supporting foundations like Bye Bye Plastic, and raising funds for Sungai Watch in Bali to clean up their once pristine beaches and prevent further ocean destruction, it only seemed fit to sit down with Jauz for our Sunday digest, Yum Cha Chats, and discuss simple and easy ways we can all contribute to a better tomorrow for our planet. The effort required is minimal, and the rewards benefit everyone.

It’s never too late to start now, even in the most basic ways we can.

Plastic waste is one of the biggest environmental issues we cause, but also one of the easiest for us to all help stop. If you always have a thermos/metal cup with you, then you can cut down on five to ten plastic cups you probably would have ended up buying that day from coffee shops, restaurants, fast food, etc. If everyone did this, we wouldn’t even need plastic cups, and that could change everything.

This is one of the biggest things I talk about to friends and family all the time - the things you buy every day, are you voting for what you believe in. If you want to help the environment, buying things that are more eco-friendly is taking away money from companies that are doing harm. An example would be buying water that comes in paper boxes instead of plastic bottles, buying plant-based biodegradable forks and knives if you need them, etc.

When you make meals at home, not only can you choose to use ingredients that are better for the environment, but you’re also not causing more trash and pollution - you can reuse your cooking utensils, your plates, your cutlery, etc. You would be surprised at how much waste you make just by eating out.

This obviously isn’t the easiest to do for everybody depending on where you live and/or work, but even if it’s just on the weekend, replacing a car ride with a bike ride every now and then is doing your part to help the environment. If everyone didn’t use their car one day out of the week, the impact we would see to helping the environment would be pretty massive.

I know no one is perfect - neither am I - but if everyone on the planet tried just a tiny bit harder every day to be less wasteful, the combined impact could be life-changing. Don’t just throw away recyclables in a trash can because it’s closer, reuse paper and plastic products at home – for example, the box your new shoes came in can be revived as an organiser for something in your room! Taking small steps like this can add up to a huge impact.