Name: Coffee cups: Do you use your own? Listen to 6 Minute English
Uploaded: 2019-08-08T04:10:01.000Z
Duration: 6 min 33 s
Description: Thousands of YouTube videos with English-Chinese subtitles! Now you can learn to understand native speakers, expand your vocabulary, and improve your pronunciation...

Hello, and welcome to 6 Minute English. I'm Neil.

Now Rob, we've talked before on this programme about our love of coffee.

Oh yes, indeed. I couldn't function without it.

But have you ever thought about the environmental consequences of all those disposable coffee cups?

Oh yes, indeed. I always carry a reusable cup with me so I don't have to throw one away.

So if a "disposable cup" is one you throw away, a "reusable one" is one that you can use again and again.

Yes, there is a big problem with disposable cups in that many of them can't be recycled, so there is a lot of waste for something we only use for a short time.

What are the big coffee shop chains doing about this problem? We'll find out a little bit more shortly, but first, a quiz for you.

Which country drinks the most coffee per capita - so not the total amount of coffee but the average per person.

Is it: a) Japan, b) Kenya, or c) Finland.

Ooh, tricky. Now, I don't think the Japanese are big coffee drinkers and I know they produce a lot of coffee in Kenya.

I'm surprised the USA isn't on the list but I'm going to go for Finland. Just because.

Well, we'll see if you're right later in the programme.

On a recent BBC "You and Yours" radio programme they discussed the topic of coffee cups.

Some of the big chains are now charging customers more for a disposable cup and giving discounts if people bring their own reusable.

However not all of the shops actually collect old cups and sort them for recycling in the shop itself.

Is the store only interested in facilities inside their shops?

It is something that we are in the process of rolling out and it will be in all of our stores.

It's also not just our stores in which these cups end up.

So we're doing a lot of work outside of our store environment to ensure that paper cups can be recycled on the go.

We're working with our environmental charity partner Hubbub to increase recycling infrastructure outside of our stores because that too is where a lot of our cups will end up.

So, are they just working in their stores at improving recycling?

Well no, after all most people take their coffee out of the stores, so they are working on the recycling infrastructure outside as well.

This will be things like bins and collection points which are clearly marked for coffee cups.

And what about enabling recycling cups in store?

Well she said that was something they are rolling out to all stores.

"Rolling out" here means introducing over a period of time.

So it's starting to happen, but it's not finished yet.

Not everyone, however, believes that the coffee chains are doing everything that they can.

This is Mary Creagh, a member of the British parliament.

She compares the situation to that of the plastic bag charge.

This was a law brought in to force shops to charge customers for plastic bags, which previously had been free.

If you think you're having to pay extra for something, as we saw with the plastic bags, we think a similar psychological measure is needed, a nudge measure, to encourage people to remember to bring their reusable cup with them.

And of course this is something that the coffee shops have been fighting tooth and nail.

She thinks that we consumers need a "nudge" to help us remember our reusable cups.

Yes, we need a nudge, which is a little push, a reason.

In this case, she is thinking of a law to make them charge more.

But she says the coffee chains really don't want this, they are, she says, fighting it tooth and nail.

If you "fight something tooth and nail," you are against it completely and try to stop it.

Time to review our vocabulary, but first, let's have the answer to the quiz question.

Which country drinks the most coffee per capita?

Well, congratulations, your guess was correct.

The Finns on average get through an amazing 12kg of coffee a year, each.

We had a couple of related but opposite words.

Something disposable is designed to be used once or a few times and then thrown away and a reusable is designed to be used again and again.

We then had "rolling out," which in a business sense is the process of gradually introducing something new.

This could be a new system, new product, new technology or even a new way of doing things.

New ideas often need new "infrastructure."

This is usually physical structures that are needed to make something work, for example rail infrastructure includes tracks, stations and signals.

A "nudge" is a small push, to encourage us to do something.

You don't need a nudge to carry a reusable coffee cup, do you?

In fact I'd "fight tooth and nail" to keep hold of my reusable, which is quite a coincidence as that was our last expression today.

"To fight tooth and nail" means to make a strong effort to try to stop something or achieve something.

We look forward to your company next time.

Until then, you can find us in all the usual places on social media, online and on our app.

Just search for "BBC Learning English." Goodbye!