What to do with our Christmas Cards

What do we do with all our Christmas cards after the fesitivities are over, as we take down our decorations and put them away for next year? We all have an abundance of Christmas cards that we have received throughout the festive season and as we take them down and read them for a last time, we smile to ourselves for all the people that thought of us from far away and also next door. What should we do with them?

The Woodland Trust is running a scheme to encourage us all to recycle our Christmas cards. They have placed recycle bins in your major shops such as Tesco, TK Maxx, Marks and Spencers, WHSmith. These bins will be present in store from the 1st of January until the 31st of January.

In 2008, 73.6 million cards were recycled this way. Recycling cards through the Woodland scheme enables the Woodland Trust to plant trees. If everyone recycles one Christmas card through these stores, the Woodland Trust will be able to plant 15000 trees to create UK woodland. 15000 trees would create a woodland the size of 30 football pitches.

If these cards are just thrown away in the bin they end up in landfill - waste sent to landfill adds to our greenhouse gases. If we all recycle just one Christmas card each this would save 1570 tonnes of CO2 equivalent greenhouse gases - the same as taking 500 cars off the road for a year. Even if you do not use this particular charity, lets all recycle this years cards.