Great Green Gift Ideas

Birthdays, weddings, Christmas, anytime!

(reproduced with slight alteration from the excellent Care2.com's"25 Great, Green Gifts Ideas", Xmas 2000)

The very best thing we can do for the Earth is simply to preserve natural resources by consuming less, but this does not at all mean that we must forgo gift giving. Giving gifts that help to sustain the Earth is an act of friendship toward all living things, not just the single recipient of the gift. Giving experiences you can share, rather than material goods, saves resources, and can deepen and enrich your friendships. You can also simply give a gift of yourself. The key to giving a gift of yourself is to know the wants and needs of the person to whom you are giving the gift. It is also important not to underestimate your own special skills and talents. One valuable aspect of giving a gift of yourself is that it is the perfect solution for those who "have everything."

Give a Gift of Yourself or Your Time

• Make dinner for someone or cook other homemade food and deliver it.
• Collect family recipes or vegetarian recipes. Make a book by inserting the recipe sheets in clear plastic holders (helps keep them clean when cooking) and assembling them in a ring binder for easy access. Cater the book to the person's needs: eg if they are about to move away from home, some simple, inexpensive meal ideas would be great!
• Offer baby-sitting time
• Offer a monthly lunch date with an elderly relative or friend
• Offer free lessons in a sport or activity in which you excel
• Weed, water or help establish a friend's garden. Offer them a plant sprouted from one in your garden.
• Offer your talents, such as photography, financial planning, or hairstyling
• Put together a photo album
• Make a video of some of the people the gift recipient loves
• Offer to do a chore for a month that a person dislikes or help out with any housework that can be done
• Make a personal voucher or certificate entitling the bearer something good (use your imagination!)

Give a Green Gift that Isn't a Thing

• give tickets to concerts, sporting events, whale watching trips etc
• give a pair of weekend tickets to a ski or other resort area
• give frequent flyer miles
• give a museum pass or sports club membership
• give an experience (a day kayaking)
• provide a gift certificate for a lesson (tennis, swimming, drumming, etc.)
• provide a gift certificate for a dinner for two
• donate something in the name of a friend or relative in a subject area of interest to them (such as for literacy training, or to protect the rainforest)
• give a gift certificate to a used book store or other ethically minded store
• give a plant or a tree

Give a Gift for the Earth

Giving a membership or donation to a nonprofit organization that does hands-on work to protect a part of the Earth's ecosystem is giving a gift that gives a gift. Not only do you enrich the life of the person to whom you give the gift, but you also help organizations that are trying to make a difference.

You could try buying someone a subscription to an environmental magazine from a nonprofit organisation or an item from an ethically minded store like People Tree/Global Village.

See our ecogroups page for a list of worthy charities.

Give for Change has selected 99 high quality environmental nonprofits, and allows you to give to them online. You can specify if you want your donation to be given as a gift to someone else.

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