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A sustainable return to the classroom – the German Environment Agency shows you how!

Even if the school holidays are only just about to start, many families are already taking the first steps in preparing to head back to school afterwards. Among other things, this means that they need to buy new exercise books, notepads and pens. Every new school year is thus another really good opportunity to be more sustainable. My colleague Ingo Schleiernick set out to find out how you can head back to school in a more environmentally friendly way – with a good conscience but without any hassle.
You can listen to this article here (mp3 format, 3.5 MB) (Only in German)

Families often start preparing for a new school year by making a lot of new purchases. Susanne Spies from the German Environment Agency explains how you can also help to protect the environment when heading back to school.

Susanne Spies: Although the word is being increasingly digital, paper is still an indispensable part of everyday school life – and this means that a very large amount of paper is consumed at school. A simple but effective tip to ensure that you can better protect the environment when heading back to school is to grab a notebook made out of recycled paper from the shelf. Studies clearly show that these notebooks are much more environmentally friendly than comparable products made of virgin fibre paper.

The Blue Angel has been certifying products produced in a particularly resource-conserving manner for over 45 years. The ecolabel is a state-approved label whose criteria are developed by the German Environment Agency.

Susanne Spies: We focus on the whole life cycle of the product and already try to reduce any negative impacts on the environment during the production process. We also want to promote products that can be easily recycled. For example, companies have to carry out on-site inspections and laboratory tests to verify that their products comply with our criteria. And I believe it is this that makes the Blue Angel particularly ambitious and also very credible.