Bamboo Straw Girl founder Melissa Lam is a strong green advocate and has engaged schools, organisations and community groups in the movement against single-use plastics. She was inspired to take individual action in the fight against wasteful consumption after spending time hiking and camping in her late teens and since then has played an active role in the local sustainability scene by sharing easy zero waste lifestyle tips on her social media as well as advocating through talks and public outreach sessions.
Since its incorporation, Bamboo Straw Girl has provided employment opportunities or supplementary streams of income for at least half a dozen South East Asian artisans. It was the very first “zero-waste lifestyle” store in Singapore even before “zero-waste” became a buzzword! It aims to be as plastic-free and low-impact as we can, from production to point of sale.
Melissa has also spoken on sustainability topics and environmental action in schools and corporate workshops as well as TEDx, and is a Singapore facilitator trained to host the 2030 SDGs Game. To Melissa, sustainability is so much more than the issue of single use plastics and disposables. She hopes that through her products and sharing sessions, people will consider wider sustainability topics such as fair trade and reducing inequalities, and realise how their everyday actions can have a meaningful impact on the world we all live in.