“Earth Day should encourage us to reflect on what we are doing to make our planet a more sustainable and liveable place.” – Scott Peters
Photo Credit: Bruce Irving
42 years ago, Earth Day was initiated to promote awareness and appreciation of our precious, fragile planet. Tomorrow, April 22nd, marks the prestigious day and will engage over a billion participants around the world. Businesses, schools, governments and individuals come together to do what they can to help make our planet a better, more livable place. The great news is that Earth Day has developed into Earth Week and now we have Earth Month. Earth Year is next, no doubt!
At Blue Osa, we like to treat every month as Earth Month and essentially, treat every day as Earth Day. April is special to us as it provides the opportunity to capture and engage a growing audience on the importance of global environmental awareness. It is a time when people from all walks of life come together to share a voice that resonates around the world.
We’re excited to be a part of such a momentous day, and have listed below a number of ways Blue Osa is staying in touch with Earth Day – from raising awareness to setting a good example with our way of life and daily rituals.
Raising Awareness
Blue Osa enjoys strong online community engagement through our various social media networks and blog. This provides us with a unique opportunity to not only talk to our audience but also engage with them every day on many different levels. As such, we wanted to use these channels as a vehicle to push the importance of Earth Day and Earth month and decided to develop our own ‘Earth Month’ theme for the blog.
Thus, April has been dedicated to everything ‘green’, ‘eco-friendly’ and ‘earthy’ in order to push the ideas of Earth Month out into the world. From Ways to Improve Your Health and Live More Sustainably, Awesome Ecotourism Attractions in Costa Rica, to Going Green on Your Travels and even what Earth Hour is all about.
Using these articles we are able to raise awareness for the cause, increase our brand equity, engage with an active audience and also simply promote a way of life that we live every day – living mindfully and working together to ensure we treat our fragile, finite planet with the respect it deserves.
Getting Involved
It’s always important to practice what you preach, and while Blue Osa is a sustainable, eco-friendly resort, there is always more that can be done. Which is why on Earth Day, April 22nd, we have come up with a few initiatives that we (staff, volunteers and guests) will take part in as part of our efforts and involvement in Earth Day.
Beach Clean Up
The morning of April 22nd will see the Blue Osa family come together to do an hour-long sweep of our beautiful beach. The tide of the gulf often brings in various litter and debris to the shore. In my short time here I’ve seen shoes, plastic and glass bottles, a backpack, wrappers and more scattered on the shore. These can obviously wreak havoc on the environment and local wildlife, so a clean up helps keep the beach clean, tidy and provides a safe environment for everyone and everything to live and play in.
Organic Garden tours
While general garden tours are offered daily to our guests, these tours will be more in-depth and focus on educating and informing guests as to what we do here at Blue Osa and our sustainable garden practices, but also give helpful tips and advice on different ways to produce and develop an organic. Guests will be shown the evolving organic garden; able to touch, feel and taste it, as well as being taken across to the plantation across the road to see the growth of our offerings such as bananas, plantains, papayas, pineapples papaya and much more! The intention of these tours is to help educate and raise awareness around sustainable initiatives that everyone can be involved with in their own backyard.
Adventure Tours
In an effort to minimize pollution for the day and partake in the movement, Blue Osa will ensure the tours on Earth Day will be completely Eco-friendly in the sense that no cars or buses will be used to get to the location and they will be completely pollution-free. This small gesture will not only get people actively walking around and immersed in their environment, but also continue the discussion around different measures we can all take to reduce our personal carbon footprint.
Switch Off
In a first for Blue Osa, we’ll be turning off our Internet for the day and will be promoting a combined effort to minimize usage of electronic devices to a needs basis. Blue Osa will provide guests with non-electronic options such as board games, books and of course, plenty of yoga! – Encouraging people to be active and social offline. By switching off, we will not only be helping the environment but we’ll also be able to able to spend some time getting to know each other. And who doesn’t love a good ole’ fashion banter now and then? Who knows, maybe we’ll even turn out all the lights and have a candle party in the temple!
Day-to-Day Rituals
While we are focusing our efforts on promoting Earth Day, here’s a list of things we do each day as an eco-resort to ensure we are as sustainable and environmentally friendly as possible.
Self-Sustainable micro-grid – Being off the grid, Blue Osa is not dependent on any external power lines and sewage system. We service 32 guests and 20 staff at maximum capacity and use about the same amount of energy that a US household of 4 people use per month.
Farm-to-table meals – Blue Osa gets all its fruit and vegetables from our own organic garden, coconut trees and pineapple patches on the property or from the local fishermen and neighboring farmers who use the same principles of organic farming.
Water and waste recycling – There is no need for a sewer system at Blue Osa. Instead of dumping waste directly into the ocean, waste goes into a bio-digestor that breaks down the waste into materials that are composted or used to water the lawns on the property. There is also a rain catchment system so when it rains; the harvested water goes right into the water tanks. Blue Osa also uses gray water from the laundry machines and puts it back into the garden.
Environmentally friendly landscaping – The beachfront is planted with a local long grass called vetiver, a perennial grass with deep roots to help prevent beach erosion. No herbicides or pesticides are used to maintain the gardens.
Promote local eco-friendly businesses – Hosting a local farmer’s market on Tuesdays, local jewelers, ice-cream vendors, and artisans display their wares for guests to buy. Blue Osa also promotes local sustainable eco-tours to the rainforest and contributes a portion of the Animal Sanctuary tour fees directly to the animal sanctuary. Blue Osa also encourages their guests to use Nature Air, the world’s only carbon-neutral airline. We also encourage their guests to use public transportation, the local collectivo.
Earth Day day provides the perfect opportunity to reflect on how we can all do our part to protect our great yet increasingly fragile planet. On April 22, we will stand united for a sustainable future and take part in an important and critical movement.
How will you celebrate Earth Day, Earth Month or Earth Year?
About the Author
Robbie Allison-Young is a drummer, writer and thrill seeker. It’s these passions that have seen him tour the world with his band, Atlantis Awaits, and more recently, trek to Costa Rica and volunteer as a writer at Blue Osa. His search is endless and destinations boundless. Watch his band here.
