Describe something you do to help the environment

Something I do for the environment is making compost from our kitchen waste. I live with my parents in an apartment in Hanoi, and on our balcony we have two plastic bins with holes, and we put there all the vegetable peels, fruit skins, tea leaves and egg shells.

I decided to do it about three years ago. At that time, people who lives near the biggest landfill of the city blocked the rubbish trucks, so for almost one week nobody collected the rubbish. The streets were full of bags and the smell was terrible. I was shocked when I realised how much of it was just food, so I watched some videos and I started.

I do it every day, actually. After every meal I put the scraps in the bin and I cover them with dry leaves or newspaper, so it doesn't smell. Then on Sundays I mix everything with a stick. After about two month it becomes a dark soil, and my mother uses it for her herbs.

I'm not sure it makes a huge difference to the world, to be honest, because it's only one family. But our rubbish bag is now half of the size than before, and two neighbours in our building has started doing it too. So I think if many people do this, the effect will be big.

What I do for the environment is compost our kitchen waste. My parents and I live in a flat in Hanoi, so there's no garden, but we've got two old plastic bins on the balcony with holes drilled in the sides, and everything from vegetable peelings to used tea leaves goes into them instead of the rubbish bag.

I got into it a few years ago, after a week when the city's rubbish simply wasn't collected. People living near the main landfill had blocked the trucks in protest, and within days the pavements in our area were lined with bags of waste. What struck me was how much of it was food, and I thought, well, at least that part doesn't have to go anywhere. So I watched a couple of tutorials and set up the bins that weekend.

It's a daily habit now. After every meal the scraps go in, covered with a layer of dry leaves or shredded newspaper to stop the smell, and every Sunday I give the whole thing a good stir. After about two months it turns into a dark, crumbly compost that my mum uses on her herb pots.

Honestly, I don't kid myself that one family is saving the planet. But our rubbish has roughly halved, and two neighbours in our building have started their own bins after seeing ours, so the idea is spreading. If even a fraction of the city did the same, the landfill would be under far less pressure.

Probably the most hands-on thing I do for the environment is composting. We live in a fourth-floor flat in Hanoi, so it's a fairly improvised set-up: two old storage bins on the balcony with holes punched in the sides, into which go our peelings, coffee grounds, tea leaves and crushed eggshells, basically anything that once grew.

The idea came out of a rather grim week a few years back. Residents near the city's main landfill had blockaded the access road, and the collections stopped altogether. Within a few days there were mounds of bin bags on every corner, and in that heat the stench was unbelievable. Walking past them, I was struck by how much of the waste was food, which seemed absurd, because food is about the one thing that can break down perfectly well on its own. So I read up on it and had the bins going by the following weekend.

It's become part of the daily routine. Scraps go in after every meal with a handful of dry leaves on top to keep the smell down, and on Sunday mornings I turn the whole lot over with a garden fork. Roughly every two months we harvest a batch of rich, crumbly compost, which my mother puts on the chillies and basil she grows in pots.

I'm under no illusion that it makes a dent in the global picture. That said, our household rubbish has roughly halved, and a couple of neighbours have copied the idea, so it's had a modest ripple effect. And I think it's changed how I see waste; I find it hard now to throw anything away without asking where it's going to end up.