Each week I'm going to highlight cool sustainable products that I'm loving. This week Jiminy.ie introduces DanToy bioplastic sandbox toys and tableware which are made from plants.

Extracting and refining petroleum to make petro-plastic is so dirty it releases 6kg of CO2 per 1kg of plastic. In contrast, bioplastic is made from plants - the leaves and stalks left-over after sugarcane is harvested. Plants absorb CO2, so bioplastic is carbon-neutral to carbon-negative!

As well as being so much greener, bioplastic is just as moldable and durable as petro-plastic. And Jiminy's bioplastic toys are extra-eco because they're made in Europe for low toy-miles and their packaging is plastic-free.

Now a little background on Jiminy.ie – they are Ireland's biggest eco-specialist distributor of kids' art supplies, crafts, and toys. Their range of toys are made in Europe to minimise their transport miles or ‘toy-miles’ carbon footprint. Jiminy toys are made of wood, innovative bioplastics (100% made from plants), recycled cardboard, paper, or safe recycled plastics. The range includes board games, flat packed toys, wooden puzzles, bouncy balance boards, construction toys, art and craft supplies, bioglitter, shadow theatres, 3D colour-ins, and lots more, covering ages 0-12+. And finally Jiminy.ie toys come unpackaged or in plastic-free compostable packaging.

Jiminy.ie is the brainchild of Dublin mum Sharon Keilthy. Sharon found toy shopping for her daughter frustrating. Nearly everything was plastic wrapped in plastic, and had been shipped 10,000km to us. So in 2018 Sharon left her senior role at an American multinational and set up Jiminy.ie to give eco-minded customers more options.

Eco-activist Sharon says: "My vision is an eco-section in every toyshop. I want to do something for the environment. Instead of complaining about how eco-unfriendly toys are, I figured, why not use my business experience and be the toy company I hope the others will become? This is my eco-activism, activism through business."