Five Eco-friendly habits to keep up after Lockdown

Living in Lockdown helped me focus on eco-friendly habits

Have you taken up more eco-friendly habits as a result of the Lockdown?

The Covid-19 Lockdown has been an unexpected and challenging time for us all.

Adjusting to the ‘new normal’ life is an interesting process too. As we move to a less restrictive Lockdown level here in New Zealand, we have to unlearn some of the behaviours we suddenly had to adopt when we went into full Lockdown.

However, there are lots of habits and behaviours that became more popular during the strict Lockdown levels that are very eco-friendly. We could benefit from keeping up with many new found or rediscovered habits, even when we go back to ‘normal’ lives.

I absolutely appreciate that many of our activities in Lockdown happened because we had the luxury of more time at home. Although this wasn’t always the case for those that were busting themselves juggling working from home, with looking after and schooling children or caring for other family members, along with other commitments. So I know that not everyone has experienced Lockdown the way have.

However, here are five eco-friendly lockdown habits that could be carried on in ‘post Lockdown’ life:

Bake at home

In our house, baking became a big thing! I love baking at home, you get to enjoy delicious (hopefully!) food, can spend time teaching children how to bake, which involves many useful skills as well as numeracy lessons, and you may be able reduce the amount of packaged shop bought items that come into your house. Flour, sugar, butter and eggs can all bought in paper or cardboard packaging, which can be recycled, composted or burnt in a wood burner.

Buy groceries online, then pick them up or have them delivered

I have ordered my groceries online for a few years now, either getting them delivered or picking them up in store. However I had started occasionally doing a grocery shop in a actual store, which always led to impulse buys and budget blow-outs! During Lockdown, I realised that doing only online shopping is incredibly convenient, helps you stick to a budget, uses less of your time, and uses less petrol when you have them delivered. It is more environmentally friendly to have one delivery truck take groceries to a whole area at the same time, compared to many individual cars driving to town to pick up shopping, particularly for rural dwellers. I’m aiming to sticking to online grocery shopping and delivery from now on.

Buy more grocery items in bulk

Some grocery items were not available in the first few weeks of Lockdown, particularly baking items. I bought flour and yeast in bulk, which resulted in less overall packaging compared to buying them in smaller amounts. I will have to make sure I use the bulk items before they reach the end of their lives, as I don’t want to waste food – that is a potential downside to buying in bulk.

Before Lockdown happened, I have also bought household items such as toilet rolls in bulk from companies like Green Cane or Smartass. They are plastic free too, just wrapped in paper or nothing at all!

Working from home more – less commuting

I always work from home, as I’m a freelancer and blogger. However this way of working was all new to my husband, who worked his usual 40 hour week at home during lockdown.

It does have its challenges, particularly when the children were at home too, but overall it saved hours in commuting time, petrol use, and wear and tear on the car.

It seems that staff from many businesses were as productive as usual while they worked from home (and maybe more so!).

I hope that companies will consider carrying on with working from home arrangements after lockdown. Even if it’s just a day a week, there will still be environmental benefits from fewer cars on the roads. And employees will benefit from spending less time commuting – time that can be spent on other activities.

Spending more time walking, running, being outside in nature

During Lockdown, my family spent more time walking and biking around our neighbourhood. We exercised more, exercised together, and got a lot more fresh air! I’d like to carry this habit on after Lockdown, as it was so good for our physical and mental health, and relationships too.

Being outside in nature everyday makes you appreciate the beauty of our environment, and reminds us how incredibly lucky we are to live in such a wonderful country. You can connect with the natural world in a deeper way, which is good for us on so many levels.

Looking for more ideas?

Want more ideas for easy eco-friendly habits? Check out my blog post about easy swaps for single use plastic or my low waste recipe ideas.

Wishing you well for as we ease out of the Lockdown restrictions. I hope you can carry on with these eco-friendly habits.