I used the carbon footprint calculator from the International Student Challenge Carbon Footprint Challenge to know how much my carbon footprint is per year. When I got my result I was expecting it to be the same as the average carbon footprint of people from the Philippines, but it turns out mine was higher than the average.  But even though it is higher for my region, it is below in terms of the worldwide average of the amount of carbon footprint per year.

I understand why in the home category my carbon footprint was higher than the local average because I always tend to be using different electronics and appliances. The main electronics I use at home are my phone and my laptop which I use almost the whole day for my schoolwork and leisure time.  It is also said in research by BusinessFibre.co.uk that the Philippines has been named as the country that uses the internet the most, with people spending an average of 10 hours a day online which is the highest amount of time across all countries measured. But I am proud to say that we value energy and water conservation, especially at home. We turn off and unplug all electronics that are not used, we don't use any heating in our water, we segregate and dispose of trash properly, and we also conserved water consumption and electricity consumption.

In terms of the category of food, I am not a vegetarian nor a vegan and I eat meat almost every day. Meat is a common ingredient in every Filipino dish whether it would be pork, beef, chicken, or fish. But after I read the book by Richard Oppenlander titled "Comfortably Unaware", I realized that it is important to understand the reality and consequences of our diet and the carbon footprint it makes on our environment which made me start eating smaller portions of meat if I can and choose a diet with more vegetables in it.

In the category of purchases, I am above average because I tend to shop for new clothes and new things at least once a month, but the clothes I always choose are the ones that I can repeatedly wear on different occasions which are the ones with minimalistic designs or plain colors. I don't tend to buy clothes that are just in trend since it would just lead it to me not wearing them and would just take closet space in my room.

In the category of transportation, I am way below average since I only use the public transportation of a minibus (also called "jeepney" here in the Philippines) every day when I go to school and go home before the pandemic started when we still had a regular face to face classes. I have never had any local or international flight which helped in giving me a lower carbon footprint in the category of transportation.

The question that still boggles me is "what else can I do to lessen my carbon footprint?" and "what else must we do to make other people lessen theirs as well?"

I am proud to say that I am lower than the global average of a carbon footprint per year but higher than the average for my local region. Every day I try my best to help lessen my carbon footprint to our world by making wiser decisions in consumer products, foods, electricity, water, and transportation but this would still not be enough for the world so we must use our voices as the youth to speak out about these issues and concerns and inspire other people to practice responsible decisions and to improve their lifestyles not just for themselves but also for their planet and the future generations.

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