Environmental sustainability is becoming increasingly important to us all. PolyU knows this well and has the capacity to give prompt responses to societal problems especially related to the environment. It holds numerous campus-wide campaigns and activities to model sustainable practices and to cultivate responsible behaviors.
PolyU creates and seizes all opportunities on campus, in and out of the classroom and office, to energize the University community to follow the green culture and adopt the bring-your-own (BYO) habits for takeaways. In addition to inviting staff and students to pledge to follow Plastic Free Friday, PolyU featured the BYO Friday buy-one-get-one-free event on 8 and 15 March 2019 with attractive incentives. Students and staff were able to enjoy a complimentary beverage when they purchased and carried the drinks at selected cafes with their reusable cups. This is another impact-generating opportunity to further promote the BYO culture and a positive attitude towards the environment.
Besides BYO incentives, PolyU also makes use of different tools and media channels to deliver active education on avoiding disposables. An interesting short video clip has been produced to shed light on how bring-your-own-cup can help. The video encourages everyone on campus to BYO cups/mugs for their takeaway drinks. It delivers a message about how BYO benefits us – reusing our own cups is easy, and it allows us a truly sustainable and satisfying experience. With just a small mug in our hands, we can all do a bit to ensure that the drink we have is part of a healthy solution for the planet.
The BYO Friday buy-one-get-one-free event and the video represent PolyU’s support to echo the Joint University Campaign UNIfy: BYO (八大BYO) as well. PolyU joined other local universities in this collective campaign to engage campus community members to take BYO actions and to reduce disposable waste by bringing their own reusable items (water bottles, cups, food containers, cutlery, bags etc.) to meet their needs. Each of the university staged its own BYO week during the week of 11 – 17 March with an array of on-campus engagement activities and discounts at their selected catering outlets.
