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Together
Composting for A More Sustainable and Zero- Waste Living
Adopting compost food scraps as a part of personal journeys towards a more sustainable and zero-waste living.
Cuifen Pui
Founding Member & Community Builder
Relationships and people are the core of a collective. Contributors of Foodscape Collective come together to explore, better understand and work towards a fair, inclusive and regenerative food system for all. The interests of these individuals span within one or more connecting parts of our Singapore food system. In this article, we feature two individuals who chose to compost food scraps as part of their personal journeys towards a more sustainable and zero-waste living.
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How did you start your zero- waste journey?
CF As one whose day job was to minimise the impact on our natural environment, I thought I did enough as a responsible human being. This thought was challenged when a colleague asked, “If you care for the environment, why was your computer switched on overnight?!” My immediate response was to defend myself and justify that I was remotely working. Still, the question made me realise two things: 1) I was not conscious of the perceived incongruence of what I say and do, and 2) I needed to expand my understanding of what it means to care for our environment. Months later, I signed up for a two-week course, ‘Youth Encounter with Sustainability’.
Soon after, I chanced upon a street of food gardens in Sydney. Anyone could walk in and harvest food for their own use. There were food compost bins at the playground. I was impressed to learn that neighbours took collective leadership of the space. It was a huge ‘aha!’ moment. I brought back a dream of wanting to create a similar space with my neighbours in Singapore.
What was your first zero-waste project?
CF It’d be the community garden that I started with neighbours. After months of knocking on doors, the idea for an edible garden took shape. Not knowing how to design gardens, I took a leap of faith and asked for help on Facebook. Debbie Han, then a permaculture garden design student, reached out.
I was mind-blown by how Debbie applied ‘basic’ science concepts in the garden design. Grow beds would have their own reservoirs, linked by swales to a pond. The pond and swales were designed based on gravity, so that watering was not needed. Herb spiral (a three-dimensional planting concept) allowed us to grow many herbs within a tiny space while providing various combinations of soil, drainage and sun exposure. Permaculture, I learnt, was about appreciating and working with what you have, and applying lessons from nature.
I learnt to make compost by doing it with neighbours. Initially, I couldn’t understand why they would voluntarily sweep the park area. When I started doing the same, I felt a mindset shift. The park no longer looked untidy with fallen leaves.
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