It's the last day of July and the last day of Plastic Free July.  We hope it is not your last day of Making a Difference – for your health, your family’s health, and the health of our planet! Nothing should stop you from making Plastic Free July turn into Plastic Free Every Day!

Here are some great ways to keep the momentum going!

Take another step in your personal life to reduce your plastic use:

• Choose an action each day – switch to reusable cups, avoid plastic packaging, bring your reusable bags, stop buying plastic disposable water bottles (and save a lot of money over the year) – all of our small steps add up to make a big difference.

• Ignore that little voice in your head that’s saying “this one time won’t matter, I’ll bring my reusable cup next time”, and instead jump into action and put that reusable cup in your car or bag.

• If you really need single use cups and bottles for your event, consider these instead of plastic: https://www.ball.com/aluminumcups/shop-now or https://drinkopenwater.com/ 

Take action to advocate for change.  Think about why you would choose a plastic-free future, not just Plastic Free July.  Who are you doing this for?  We McSisters are choosing to act to create a plastic free future for our children and grandchildren, and of course, for all the wildlife on land and in the ocean.

Not everyone feels comfortable to advocate for change, but it can be quite easy. Try one of these steps.

• You can sign a petition to urge Costco to reduce its packaging:  https://environmentamerica.org/california/take-action/call-on-costco-to-move-beyond-single-use-plastic-packaging/

• Watch this video and sign the petition to get plastic out of our nation’s school cafeterias. https://actionnetwork.org/petitions/f2ee84cf68c723f698b840de74bbdff55f9639c1?source=direct_link&referrer=group-plasticpollutioncoalition

• Join this webinar for a Plastic Free Back to School. https://www.plasticpollutioncoalition.org

• You can advocate for a strong International Plastic Treaty BUT first, learn more about the Treaty negotiations from The Story of Stuff Project: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xoHCkniPt9w

• Then contact U.S. government officials and urge the U.S. to reduce production of plastic and construction of new plastic factories. 

• See  Greenpeace’s website:  https://www.greenpeace.org/usa/the-us-position-on-the-global-plastics-treaty-isnt-nearly-strong-enough-heres-where-they-currently-stand-vs-where-we-need-them-to-be/

• See Action Network’s website:  https://actionnetwork.org/petitions/global-plastics-treaty-us/

 Why is Plastic Free July and Plastic Free Every Day so important? Read this report from the United Nations Environment Program:

• https://www.unep.org/news-and-stories/press-release/historic-day-campaign-beat-plastic-pollution-nations-commit-develop

We can be the solution if we take action and speak up!