This year’s Sustainable Christmas Market (SCM) achieved its target, having raised S$350,000 on Sunday (Nov 17) afternoon.

The money will be donated to the Singapore Red Cross’s Young Hearts program, which benefits disadvantaged children and youth living in public rental housing. The program provides academic support, enrichment activities and mentoring in hopes of lifting them out of intergenerational poverty.

The third edition of SCM, organized by the non-profit organization Peace of Art, took place this weekend in South Beach. It featured a green market with environmentally conscious vendors as well as interactive workshops and activities. With a focus on net zero emissions targets, it aimed to be as sustainable as possible – from the set-up of the event to the selected suppliers to the public workshops.

Zero waste

Eunice Yeo, founder of Peace of Art, said she wanted the event to be based on the concept of circularity, which involves reusing and recycling existing materials for as long as possible.

For example, the main stage was made entirely from reused materials. The pallets have been used several times by a pallet supplier and will be returned after the event. The scaffolding forming the decoration comes from a construction site. The artwork decorating the backdrop was made from textile waste pieced together by children from Fashion Parade, an initiative that promotes sustainable and circular fashion.

“All our kampung roofs (for vendor stalls) will be stored and reused next year,” Yeo added.

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The local farm provided a live farm-to-table demonstration, showing how visitors’ food waste could be composted on site within six hours. This showed how compost could feed the vegetables used by vendors.

The Declutter and Donate Bazaar encouraged waste reduction. Myhalo, a sustainability platform that deals with e-waste, has shown how small electronic devices such as laptops, tablets and headphones can be refurbished for another user or donated to disadvantaged communities.

Tan Ching Hwee, founder and chief executive of Myhalo, said: “We promote recycling, which means we try to return as many devices as possible to the circular economy. »

When planning the SCM, Yeo worked with sustainability consultancy firm Climate Asia to “help the whole event be net zero and carbon neutral,” she said. The company received data from each supplier on their carbon emissions – after calculating the total amount, the carbon emissions generated will be offset using the recommended carbon services.

Promote a sustainable lifestyle

Yeo said the SCM organizing committee was selective in choosing vendors because it wanted to feature vendors selling sustainable products that “set an example of what life should be.”

One of the vendors was The Green and Purple Movement, an initiative that creates edible gardens in underutilized spaces. Organically grown vegetables are sold by subscription. It works with charities to provide jobs for disabled people – particularly those aged 18 and over – and older people.

Geraldine Tan, founding director of the Green and Purple Movement, said: “It’s a closed-loop system. We work with the neighborhood, they bring in all their food scraps, we make our own compost, then we grow the vegetables.

She previously worked in the food industry where she trained people with special needs in cooking and serving food. However, she realized that most of them were more suited to horticulture and got involved in this initiative.

Since its inception in 2021, Sustainable Markets has raised over S$1 million for children in need.