Holiday gift giving is probably the area that offers the greatest opportunity for deepening sustainability. From fair trade items like jewelry, crafts, clothing, and even food to organic baby toys and furniture, to making donations to local non-profits and charities on behalf of others, to volunteering or giving gifts of time or in-kind services. Re-gifting is a perfectly acceptable way to minimize waste following the principle of the 3 Rs (Re-use, Reduce and Recycle) –provided the items you’re re-gifting bring some value to the people you plan to give them to.

Culinary and handmade gifts are an excellent choice. It’s hard not to love a box of handmade cookies, a beautiful holiday cake, or even a carefully prepared meal made in your kitchen with love. If you’re too busy to cook, you can do a variation on this theme by making gift baskets with all the ingredients necessary to prepare a batch of your famous chocolate chip cookies or a delicious pasta dinner. To keep it as green as possible, be sure to use organic, fair trade, or locally produced ingredients.

Last month while walking the floor at the San Francisco Green Festival, I found a couple of items I thought would make interesting “green” gifts. The first was Hydros Bottles. These are re-usable BPA-free plastic water bottles with built-in filters. This Company also donates $1 from every sale to Engineers Without Borders as part of their effort to provide clean drinking water to a village in Cameroon so $1 provides 2,000 gallons of potable water. For more information checkout their web site at http://www.hydrosbottle.com.

The next item that caught my attention was Esse Reusable Bags. They make a complete reusable shopping bag system called the Carryall Tote –6 different bags in 1 convenient tote. They also have some of the most stylish reusable bags I’ve seen so far. You can check it out at their site: http://www.esselife.com.

Last but not least was Janielle Gibson’s Soul Gems. This dedicated jewelry designer has created a lovely line of sterling silver jewelry. 100% of the profit is donated to charities working to combat sex trafficking. You can read more about this on her site at http://www.soulgems.org.

And remember to keep the amount of gift-wrap you use to a minimum and forgo typical wrapping paper in favor of recycled or recyclable Kraft or white butcher paper. You can embellish your plain paper wrapping with reusable fabric ribbons like grosgrain, satin or organdy. Or opt for all natural materials like raffia and sinamay. You can also try read-made velvet cloth bags or organza pouches.