Like any consumer-driven Holiday in the west, Valentine's Day has become an excessive and wasteful celebration. While trying to express our love for friends, family and partners, we litter the planet with non-recyclable candy wrappers, take away containers carrying the dinner we couldn't finish and stock the shelves of our landfills by purchasing unnecessary cheap trinkets that will inevitably fall apart. And the consequences of our wasteful celebrations are felt intensely by the planet's waterways.

This Valentine's Day, let's show our love for the water by making an effort to waste less. Here are some tips for a waste-free Valentine's Day:

It's a different world now than it was back in 2012 when former mayor Rob Ford put the "final nail in the plastic-bag-ban-coffin" and opinions on bans are not such a mixed bag, now being put firmly in place around the world. Following on the heels of Montreal and Victoria, Toronto city councillors Mike Layton and Mary-Margaret McMahon have finally reignited the conversation here.

Let's make 2018 a year of action in defence of our most precious resource - WATER.Water is under threat and facing abuse from all sides: from giant corporations stealing groundwater to bottle and sell it for profit to unsustainable fishing practices that are destroying the balance of life under the waves to excessive plastic waste choking our oceans. Here are 12 actions you can take - one for every month of the year if you like! - in defence of water.