Current Consumption Habits Sustainable

The following essay will be considering the question “To what extent are current consumption habits sustainable?”. Firstly I would like to define a number of terms to be able to fully understand the idea of consumption habits, such as consumption, habits, sustainability, planned and perceived obsolescence, rate, mass media, ethical, GMO, waste, and finite. Sustainability is the ability to be able to maintain or keep at a constant or certain rate. Consumption is taking in something or a resource. Habit is a tendency of a usual practice, mass media is the media, which is the large means of communication. Ethical means that a certain action is morally correct. Rate is the level at which something is moving along or going. Planned and perceived

One way is the reduced use of insecticides by 230 kg due to the use of insect-resistant crops, which before killed many crops and other nearby organisms. They also reduce greenhouse gas emissions, which are gases that contribute to the greenhouse effect by absorbing and emitting infrared radiation, quite bad as it is a factor of global warming. However, there are ways that our current consumption habits are unsustainable, as, for the GMO industry, the mass media does not know all the effects and facts about GMO foods. Though most of us have eaten GMO’s, we have not been informed about what has been modified or switched or ingredients. An example of this is the use of antibiotics in GMO food. They make antibiotics for humans less effective because GMOs already have them while you eat. So now the antibiotics we take won’t be as effective because there are already in their food for the crop to be resistant to disease. Even though GMO’s do help protect the environment, they can also cause a loss of biodiversity. The other problem is that loss of biodiversity, as, during gene transfer, some genes can escape into the wild. An example is the weed crops. If those genes go into the crops, this can make them impossible to kill, as they are known now “super-weeds”. GMO’s are also

To try and improve the problem of consumerism and sustainability we have to promote waste management as advertisers take 40% of the global digital market, meaning more than 1.28 billion people can witness the advertisements and raise awareness, as we need it know more than ever. The reason we need this in order for our consumer habits to sustain is that we are starting to produce more waste in the 2010’s. In 2016 household waste volumes per person in England was 412 kg alone, which is an example of overconsumption. Overconsumption is the act of consumption all the way to the excess. So if advertisements can start to demonstrate the effects of consumption on the mass media, and how much we use, it may put things into perspective and reduce