It always so lovely to know of women who through their personal experiences, make such a postive difference in the world, one of these women is Vicky Penfold, who is offering a free trial pack of her Bio-Baba range (see Monthly Competition in the blog sidebar). Here is her story.
On discovering I was pregnant for the first time, I immediately decided that a few things had to change! The first was to give up smoking which was surprisingly easy; to give up a stable job and move to the suburbs was not as straight forward. After working as an editor of travel, investment and mining publications as well as three years as the Regional Marketing Manager for a large systems integration firm, and briefly in PR, I had my feet firmly entrenched in ‘the corporate world’. Our house was conveniently close to Cape Town city centre and was a lock-up and go…with no real garden to speak of. What garden there was tumbled onto the street which was frequently lined with rubbish and beggars. Not for MY baby! We started looking for a house that was in a cleaner suburb, with some space for a toddler to run and play in a garden. Needless to say we only found something suitable and moved in a month before giving birth! I also resigned from my job and so did my husband! He had been teaching in town in various language schools, but it was now time to put down roots and ‘get serious’ about starting his own company. This was very scary, but paid off as he now has his own successful translating business – and he works from home which is fantastic for the kids. I was more than content not to have to go to work and just stay home with baby, but after a few months I found myself needing something a little more than nappies to talk about. Ironically, this was not meant to be! When I first started using nappies in 2002 after the birth of my son Hugo, the only alternative on the South African market to ‘disposables’ was the ‘Terri nappy’, which is the one that you have to fold, use a safety pin and a plastic waterproof with. This just seemed so ‘old-fashioned’ and far too much effort. I had seen fitted nappies from friends who had bought them overseas (where they are readily available and hugely popular) and wondered why there was nothing like it on the South African market. That is when the ‘project’ started! I called a friend who is a dressmaker and gave her a pattern to make up some samples which were duly tested on my son. Each month the design would change, the layers and types of fabric would alter –this was real trial and error! Working for yourself is not easy, especially in a field that you have no previous knowledge. If someone had told me 5 years ago that my life’s work would be to ‘design,manufacture and distribute eco-friendly nappies as an alternative to disposables’ I would have laughed hard and dismissed the idea as ludicrous! However, the amount of time and work I had put into my ‘project’ meant that, above all, I had to take myself seriously.That is why I sought out the guidance of the folk at the Umsobomvu Youth Fund. The fund was established by the government in an attempt to address the youthunemployment challenge in South Africa and, through its Voucher Programme, helpwith business plan development. This was an essential part of getting my business off theground…an idea is one thing…making it a viable business venture is another kettle offish entirely! At the end of 2004 I did my first production run in a factory with ladies I had trained in Grassy Park…after nearly having a nervous break-down I went on the Christmas holidays with family in Durban. Then the most truly awful thing happened, on Boxing Day of 2004, a tsunami, of unimaginable proportions struck the countries of South East Asia. Unfortunately, my brother Justin and his fiancée Seda were holidaying on the Thai island of Phi Phi at the time, needless to say, neither of them survived. Seda’s body was identified by an unusual tattoo on her shoulder; nearly 2 years after the event. She was repatriated to Turkey and buried just before Christmas 2006. Much of the early part of 2005 was spent in mourning and travelling around the world attending memorial services in Justin’s honour. During this time I met many truly amazing people who were united in their grief for loved ones. They also all shared acommon philosophy, and that is that ‘The planet is in crisis ’. A human tragedy and natural disaster of this scale is an enormously humbling thing and made me acutely aware of how interconnected we are, and just how fragile the planet is.On returning from Zimbabwe in June of 2005, I was resolved that my passion for raising awareness of the environmental impact of disposable nappies was no accident and setabout thinking of ways to ‘get the message across’ to the largest number of people, in the shortest possible time. My business is my way of honouring my brother’s life. I believe that Bio-Baba nappies are the best alternative to the billions of disposable nappies dumped each year (making disposable nappies one of the biggest waste contributors on the planet). I do not want my children to grow up in a waste land. I consol myself after a sleepless night of looking after small children that I am ‘doing my bit’ to ensure that South Africa does not become one! In February 2006, I was blessed with another baby boy, Todd Niran Clarke… ‘Niran’ isa Thai name meaning ‘Eternal’), and have been supported through all the hard times withlove and infinite patience by my husband Greg. 2005 was incredibly difficult for my whole family, but in the words of the Archbishop of Canterbury, in a memorial at St. Paul’s Cathedral of that year “love can continue to grow, even on the soil of the worst pain and the deepest doubt”...this is so true of life, andof business too. If you love what you do, and believe in it – it will grow into something meaningful.
- FACTS YOU SHOULD KNOW WHEN DECIDING ON NAPPIES: If you have a baby in disposable nappies in your home, your household waste doubles!
- In 2½years in disposable nappies a baby will have:üused 325kg of plastic 20 trees worth of pape produced at least 1 tonne & landfill space.
- Disposable nappies are pegged at the world’s 3rd biggest household waste contributors behind newspapers at No.1 and containers/packaging for food. Your household is no different… millions are thrown away annually in SA, 9 million a day in the UK and 20 billion a year in the US and Canada…they do not bio-degrade!
- Saliem Haider at the City Waste Mangement has this to say: “Cape Town is facing a major landfill airspace crisis. Two years ago 6 landfills were operational, and a few months from now we would have only 3 operational… There are some smaller municipalities in the Western Cape with bigger problems than Cape Town. The Johannesburg City area also has a crisis at hand.”
- Waste in South Africa is currently growing at 5% faster than the population growth.
- Nappies are classified as medical waste and should be incinerated – however individual municipalities in South Africa do not have the resources to do this there is the Polokwane Declaration which the Govt. has signed which means that there is a mandate to reduce our waste by a specific %....however, we all have a mandate to watch over our resources…and we all know – if we wait for govt… we might waita long long time!
- Landfill sites are not designed or allowed to contain faeces, human or otherwise, and thus have no solution to the enormous number of soiled disposable nappies arriving daily. Baby ‘poop’ in disposable nappies SHOULD be flushed down the toilet before the nappy is disposed of correctly in the sewarge system – however notmany people know this or can be bothered to do it before chucking their nappies in the bin.
ENERGY & RESOURCE IMPACT STATISTICS: DISPOSABLES VS REUSABLES
- Requires 3.5 x more energy to produce
- Uses 8 x more non-regenerable raw materials
- Uses 90 x more renewable material
- Produces 2.3 x as much waste water
- Produces 60 x as much solid waste
- Needs 4 – 30 x more land for growing natural materials
- Take 5 fingers and put them on your nose…that is where the buck stops.
- Reduce, Re-use, Re-cycle.
- Children live what they learn… choose a sustainable future for your baby.
- For more information on incorporating cloth nappies into your routine, please contact:
