Kate Evans
In August the New Economics Foundation combined current greenhouse gas concentrations, their estimated growth rates, maximum concentration allowable to forestall potentially irreversible changes to the climate system, and the effect of those environmental feedbacks to predict that we had only 100 months until we reach the beginning of irreversible climate change. Due to ironically titled “positive feedback” mechanisms, once a critical greenhouse concentration threshold is passed, global warming will continue even if we stop releasing additional greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. If that happens, the climate will move into a more volatile state, with different ocean circulations, wind and rainfall patterns - the implications of which would be catastrophic for life on Earth.
Given all of this, why isn’t everyone acting to prevent this? Mainly because people are unwilling to change their lifestyles to the extent that is needed to adequately reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and politicians don’t want to impose measures on people that they believe will be unpopular, for obvious reasons.
Part of the blame has to lie with the environmental movement itself. The opening paragraph to this piece is testimony to the kind of doom that we all to often preach. But while the consequences of inaction should be kept in mind, not enough attention is given to the positive effects that leading a sustainable life would bring. We need to use our imaginations to inspire the majority into taking positive steps to change their lives. Or, as Caroline Lucas has put it - Martin Luther King did not have a nightmare: he had a dream. (I know, I cringed to.)
At the moment, cutting down your carbon footprint sounds like a bit of a chore. Public transport, for example, is not always a pleasant experience – expensive, crowded, very often late. Compared with the alternative of a nice warm car with your own choice of music and company and it’s easier to see why people don’t always pick the greenest way to travel.
But lets follow the car alternative through, for example, on a trip to the supermarket.
1. You get stuck in a traffic jam. Tapping impatiently on the steering wheel indicates a growing irritation.
2. You have trouble parking. Blood pressure continues to rise as you drive round and around the car park. Somebody sneaks into a space in front of you; you make a rude gesture out the window.
3. You eventually get into the supermarket; it’s crowded, you can’t find what you want, you start getting inexplicably angry at the people in front of you in the queue.
Now think about the alternatives.
1. You walk to the greengrocers along the street, who is someone you know because you go there all the time. Vegetable buying is combined with gossiping and you come home not only with food, but having experienced both exercise and human interaction.
2. You cycle (more exercise, plus it’s fun to freewheel down the big hill) to your allotment to harvest produce and do a spot of weeding. The food is cheap, plus you get that satisfied feeling of having grown it yourself.
3. You stay in bed watching Scrubs while a local organic farm delivers a box of vegetables to your house.
Taken a step further, cutting down on carbon could involve producing your own electricity, using what you need and selling the rest back to the grid, ending the arrival of big bills on your doorstep. Eating no meat and less dairy is healthier, cheaper and forces you to be more adventurous with food. Instead of letting consumerism drive your free time, have friends round to cook for. Play bored games, mess about, go on picnics, climb trees – anything other than ‘going into town’ for the day. Spending less money could also mean you don’t have to work as much, reducing the need to spend money in the pub/club to ‘unwind.’
So there you are, lead a more environmental lifestyle and save time and money, be less stressed and live a healthier life. That is, if I haven’t made you nauseous with these romanticised ideals of sustainable living.
[The author has been in no way influenced by a personal hatred of supermarket shopping]
Friday, 2 January 2009
Do you have to be middle class to be green?
Anne Clarke
In discussing green consumerism, people commonly assert that being green is too expensive to be a reality for a lot of people. However, being green only needs to be middle class if you take a narrow view of the way in which you can take responsibility for the un-environmental and unethical effects our lifestyles have. Whilst it is true that buying green or ethical options can be more expensive than other options (especially ‘value’ or ‘economy’ lines), the really radical way to be ‘green’ today is to live more simply: to simply consume less. This green lifestyle option is certainly within range of a lot more people.
In the lead up to Christmas and the crazy consumerism that accompanies this, I have been unable to stop asking myself how much of this spending is actually needed. We all know that we are living at an unsustainable level but we still seem unable to break our consumer habits of buying unnecessarily. For example it would be almost socially impossible for most people to choose not to buy Christmas presents on the basis of them being unneeded and therefore bad for the environment; an unnecessary use of increasingly scarce resources. Without wanting to sound like a Scrooge, if green choices such as this became more acceptable, it would be as easy to make a difference by not buying something, as by buying something ‘green’ or ethical. There has been some recognition recently of this ‘gap in the market’ so to speak though. In the last few years there has been a huge growth in both the diversity and popularity of schemes such as Oxfam’s ‘Giving Gifts’, where the present you give to somebody in fact benefits someone else in the developing world who actually needs a ‘gift’; an effective and accepted means of thoughtful wealth distribution.
We all know that we are in the better off half of the world’s population, but too often we feel powerless to effectively change this situation and help distribute global resources equitably. This is not made any easier by the way the media often portrays both poverty and ‘natural’ disasters as inevitable and unavoidable, lessening the responsibility one might feel as a ‘global citizen’. In this sense nearly everybody in our country is ‘middle class’, when you compare our levels of wealth to those of people across the world; because we do have non-essential income we can use this to make changes if we choose to.
We are currently living at a completely unsustainable level, consuming about three times more than we can afford to. Thus anything we do which stops the creation of waste or the usage of resources is good. This could be anything from not running a car, to composting, to using renewable energy, to reducing the amount of animal products we eat, to using reusable bags or cycling or buying clothes from charity shops. The range of options is sufficient for everybody, whatever their income, to make some lifestyle changes, not necessarily encompassing spending money or buying certain things, which will make a difference in making the world a more ‘green’ place.
In addition, ethical or green shopping options may not actually be much more expensive than what people are already buying, unless they are truly living on the bread line. A few examples: recycled toilet paper, fair-trade chocolate (especially at the Co-op!), fair-trade orange juice, bananas, tea and coffee, soya milk, tofu or other vegan options (especially when you work it out per portion!), and local fruit and veg.
For me, as a campaigner, the cheapest and most effective green thing to do is to campaign for differences in the world that it is hard to achieve on an individual level. People often feel powerless where government decisions or business actions are concerned but campaigning, and making your views known as a consumer and citizen, is one way to redress this lack of power, and best of all, it is pretty much free!
In discussing green consumerism, people commonly assert that being green is too expensive to be a reality for a lot of people. However, being green only needs to be middle class if you take a narrow view of the way in which you can take responsibility for the un-environmental and unethical effects our lifestyles have. Whilst it is true that buying green or ethical options can be more expensive than other options (especially ‘value’ or ‘economy’ lines), the really radical way to be ‘green’ today is to live more simply: to simply consume less. This green lifestyle option is certainly within range of a lot more people.
In the lead up to Christmas and the crazy consumerism that accompanies this, I have been unable to stop asking myself how much of this spending is actually needed. We all know that we are living at an unsustainable level but we still seem unable to break our consumer habits of buying unnecessarily. For example it would be almost socially impossible for most people to choose not to buy Christmas presents on the basis of them being unneeded and therefore bad for the environment; an unnecessary use of increasingly scarce resources. Without wanting to sound like a Scrooge, if green choices such as this became more acceptable, it would be as easy to make a difference by not buying something, as by buying something ‘green’ or ethical. There has been some recognition recently of this ‘gap in the market’ so to speak though. In the last few years there has been a huge growth in both the diversity and popularity of schemes such as Oxfam’s ‘Giving Gifts’, where the present you give to somebody in fact benefits someone else in the developing world who actually needs a ‘gift’; an effective and accepted means of thoughtful wealth distribution.
We all know that we are in the better off half of the world’s population, but too often we feel powerless to effectively change this situation and help distribute global resources equitably. This is not made any easier by the way the media often portrays both poverty and ‘natural’ disasters as inevitable and unavoidable, lessening the responsibility one might feel as a ‘global citizen’. In this sense nearly everybody in our country is ‘middle class’, when you compare our levels of wealth to those of people across the world; because we do have non-essential income we can use this to make changes if we choose to.
We are currently living at a completely unsustainable level, consuming about three times more than we can afford to. Thus anything we do which stops the creation of waste or the usage of resources is good. This could be anything from not running a car, to composting, to using renewable energy, to reducing the amount of animal products we eat, to using reusable bags or cycling or buying clothes from charity shops. The range of options is sufficient for everybody, whatever their income, to make some lifestyle changes, not necessarily encompassing spending money or buying certain things, which will make a difference in making the world a more ‘green’ place.
In addition, ethical or green shopping options may not actually be much more expensive than what people are already buying, unless they are truly living on the bread line. A few examples: recycled toilet paper, fair-trade chocolate (especially at the Co-op!), fair-trade orange juice, bananas, tea and coffee, soya milk, tofu or other vegan options (especially when you work it out per portion!), and local fruit and veg.
For me, as a campaigner, the cheapest and most effective green thing to do is to campaign for differences in the world that it is hard to achieve on an individual level. People often feel powerless where government decisions or business actions are concerned but campaigning, and making your views known as a consumer and citizen, is one way to redress this lack of power, and best of all, it is pretty much free!
The Great GM Debate
Laura Murphy
Should we allow the DNA of an organism to be changed? It’s a contentious topic and one that’s open to scandal and sensationalism from both sides. But, for me, it comes down to costs vs benefits and having faith in humanity.
For some, its humans attempting to play god and reeking havoc with nature’s design, for others it’s a golden opportunity to improve the world. But, how different are GM organisms to conventional ones? GM advocates argue that by adding genes to an organism we are just speeding up the process of selective breeding that farmers have been doing for centuries. For example, over the centuries farmers have selectively bred cows so that those today have genes for high milk production. Exactly the same result could have been achieved by genetic modification but, it would have been done in one step rather than taking hundreds of years. This argument only works for moving genes between the same species of course, adding a jelly fish gene to wheat could never have happened by selective breeding!
So, sometimes GM and non GM organisms are not as different as the media would have us believe. It is also a matter of spin: we are always being warned of the dangers of genetically modifying food, but, whenever gene therapy- (the treatment of people with genetic diseases by replacing the faulty gene) is mentioned it is welcomed as a miracle cure, even though it is essentially genetically modifying humans!
But, spin and propaganda aside, genetic modification certainly carries risk. It is true that the long term effects of eating GM crops are not known. All we can say is that no health problems have been found so far. Another concern is our ability to control GM organisms once they are released into the wild. Genes can move in between varieties of the same species so GM crops could potentially contaminate organic varieties although the evidence is not strong for this.
Many of the potential dangers of GM technology depend on what it is used for. Some people are suggesting that crops could be genetically modified to contain pesticides to decrease pest damage. However, these toxins would also be toxic to wildlife and so could decrease biodiversity. In the future it may be possible to genetically modify animals reared for meat (to produce more muscle and less fat for example), but, what effects will this have on animal welfare? If we are looking at the extreme this technology could probably be used to engineer “super viruses” to be used as bio-weapons in warfare.
However, GM is a vastly wide ranging technology which could also bring amazing benefits for humanity and improve the lives of people around the world. For example, work is underway on genetically modifying a banana so that it contains the vaccine for Hepatitis B, a virus that infects twenty million people a year. This would allow vaccines to be distributed to remote parts developing countries in a cheap, reliable way that does not require refrigeration. GM technology could also help to solve the world food crisis by engineering crops to have greater nutritional value or to produce two harvests a year rather than one. Climate change is likely to cause large scale drought in many countries and so crops modified to be drought-resistant could save thousands of lives in the developing world.
So it seems that both amazing benefits and terrible destruction could come from the use of GM technology. For me, the difference is nothing to do with the technology but everything to do with responsibility. Obviously the GM industry would have to be tightly controlled so that destructive and exploitative products were not developed. But, to look and the potentially harmful outcome of GM and decided to ban the technology, is like throwing the baby out with the bath water. There are so many amazing advances that GM could bring, that to put a blanket ban on the technology is bordering on recklessness. With a responsible attitude and tight control I believe it is possible for GM technology to make only a positive contribution to the world.
For more information on GM please visit: http://www.defra.gov.uk/environment/gm/index.htm
Should we allow the DNA of an organism to be changed? It’s a contentious topic and one that’s open to scandal and sensationalism from both sides. But, for me, it comes down to costs vs benefits and having faith in humanity.
For some, its humans attempting to play god and reeking havoc with nature’s design, for others it’s a golden opportunity to improve the world. But, how different are GM organisms to conventional ones? GM advocates argue that by adding genes to an organism we are just speeding up the process of selective breeding that farmers have been doing for centuries. For example, over the centuries farmers have selectively bred cows so that those today have genes for high milk production. Exactly the same result could have been achieved by genetic modification but, it would have been done in one step rather than taking hundreds of years. This argument only works for moving genes between the same species of course, adding a jelly fish gene to wheat could never have happened by selective breeding!
So, sometimes GM and non GM organisms are not as different as the media would have us believe. It is also a matter of spin: we are always being warned of the dangers of genetically modifying food, but, whenever gene therapy- (the treatment of people with genetic diseases by replacing the faulty gene) is mentioned it is welcomed as a miracle cure, even though it is essentially genetically modifying humans!
But, spin and propaganda aside, genetic modification certainly carries risk. It is true that the long term effects of eating GM crops are not known. All we can say is that no health problems have been found so far. Another concern is our ability to control GM organisms once they are released into the wild. Genes can move in between varieties of the same species so GM crops could potentially contaminate organic varieties although the evidence is not strong for this.
Many of the potential dangers of GM technology depend on what it is used for. Some people are suggesting that crops could be genetically modified to contain pesticides to decrease pest damage. However, these toxins would also be toxic to wildlife and so could decrease biodiversity. In the future it may be possible to genetically modify animals reared for meat (to produce more muscle and less fat for example), but, what effects will this have on animal welfare? If we are looking at the extreme this technology could probably be used to engineer “super viruses” to be used as bio-weapons in warfare.
However, GM is a vastly wide ranging technology which could also bring amazing benefits for humanity and improve the lives of people around the world. For example, work is underway on genetically modifying a banana so that it contains the vaccine for Hepatitis B, a virus that infects twenty million people a year. This would allow vaccines to be distributed to remote parts developing countries in a cheap, reliable way that does not require refrigeration. GM technology could also help to solve the world food crisis by engineering crops to have greater nutritional value or to produce two harvests a year rather than one. Climate change is likely to cause large scale drought in many countries and so crops modified to be drought-resistant could save thousands of lives in the developing world.
So it seems that both amazing benefits and terrible destruction could come from the use of GM technology. For me, the difference is nothing to do with the technology but everything to do with responsibility. Obviously the GM industry would have to be tightly controlled so that destructive and exploitative products were not developed. But, to look and the potentially harmful outcome of GM and decided to ban the technology, is like throwing the baby out with the bath water. There are so many amazing advances that GM could bring, that to put a blanket ban on the technology is bordering on recklessness. With a responsible attitude and tight control I believe it is possible for GM technology to make only a positive contribution to the world.
For more information on GM please visit: http://www.defra.gov.uk/environment/gm/index.htm
Young Friends of the Earth Climate Tour: The Countdown to Poz’n’Hagen
Joe Thwaites
Annoying fish‘n’chip abbreviations aside, the Friends of the Earth Climate Tour is living up to its epic movie-style title. I was among (roughly) 50 young people aged between (roughly) 18 and 30, from 26 different countries who were chosen from a (probably not very) rigorous selection process to participate in a climate change tour spanning 15 months, 3 countries, 2 United Nations Climate Change Conferences and 1 bitterly cold week of camping.
For those of you whose memories stretch far enough back to December 2007, you may remember UN Bali Conference, where they agreed to agree on a new international agreement to tackle climate change in Copenhagen in 2009. Yes that’s right, all the tears and booing was to agree to have an agreement 2 years later. Such is the wonderful world of international relations.
Basically, the Kyoto Protocol has a best before end date: 2012. Because of the time it takes to ratify international treaties, any post-Kyoto agreement to limit greenhouse gas emissions and avert well dodgy climate change (that’s a technical term) must be decided in the next few years.
There are UN Climate Change Conferences every December, and as a group, we will be going to this year’s conference in Poznan, Poland and then Copenhagen next year.
We’re organised into 3 groups, all concentrating on a different aspect of campaigning.
There’s the direct action group. These guys are armed with hundreds of metres of fabric, megaphones and snowballs. They’re loud and unhinged.
Then there’s the lobbying group, which I’m in. We’re armed with peer-reviewed science and will use our intellect, charm and power-suits to schmooze the official delegates.
Finally there’s the media group, who are adamant that they’re not just spending the entire time on Facebook, and are going to make climate change really hit the headlines.
We’ve formulated 3 key demands which we will be putting to delegates with the hope that they will be included in the key decisions – worldwide emissions cuts of 30% by 2020 and 90% by 2050; consideration of climate justice (things like the right to development and avoiding false solutions) and an important technical change to the way CO2 emissions are measured which will help further highlight the inequalities between developed and developing countries.
But we can’t do this on our own, no matter how amazing and talented we are.
Lobbying in Poland will only be effective if it’s backed up by actions all around the world showing that citizens everywhere are watching their country’s delegation make the right decisions. That’s why you should get involved with the global day of action on 6th December.
Or come to Poznan…
But you won’t get in…
Because you’re not cool enough.
To find out more, see: www.globalclimatecampaign.org.
To see what you’re missing on our climate tour, check out: www.youthclimatetour.eu
Annoying fish‘n’chip abbreviations aside, the Friends of the Earth Climate Tour is living up to its epic movie-style title. I was among (roughly) 50 young people aged between (roughly) 18 and 30, from 26 different countries who were chosen from a (probably not very) rigorous selection process to participate in a climate change tour spanning 15 months, 3 countries, 2 United Nations Climate Change Conferences and 1 bitterly cold week of camping.
For those of you whose memories stretch far enough back to December 2007, you may remember UN Bali Conference, where they agreed to agree on a new international agreement to tackle climate change in Copenhagen in 2009. Yes that’s right, all the tears and booing was to agree to have an agreement 2 years later. Such is the wonderful world of international relations.
Basically, the Kyoto Protocol has a best before end date: 2012. Because of the time it takes to ratify international treaties, any post-Kyoto agreement to limit greenhouse gas emissions and avert well dodgy climate change (that’s a technical term) must be decided in the next few years.
There are UN Climate Change Conferences every December, and as a group, we will be going to this year’s conference in Poznan, Poland and then Copenhagen next year.
We’re organised into 3 groups, all concentrating on a different aspect of campaigning.
There’s the direct action group. These guys are armed with hundreds of metres of fabric, megaphones and snowballs. They’re loud and unhinged.
Then there’s the lobbying group, which I’m in. We’re armed with peer-reviewed science and will use our intellect, charm and power-suits to schmooze the official delegates.
Finally there’s the media group, who are adamant that they’re not just spending the entire time on Facebook, and are going to make climate change really hit the headlines.
We’ve formulated 3 key demands which we will be putting to delegates with the hope that they will be included in the key decisions – worldwide emissions cuts of 30% by 2020 and 90% by 2050; consideration of climate justice (things like the right to development and avoiding false solutions) and an important technical change to the way CO2 emissions are measured which will help further highlight the inequalities between developed and developing countries.
But we can’t do this on our own, no matter how amazing and talented we are.
Lobbying in Poland will only be effective if it’s backed up by actions all around the world showing that citizens everywhere are watching their country’s delegation make the right decisions. That’s why you should get involved with the global day of action on 6th December.
Or come to Poznan…
But you won’t get in…
Because you’re not cool enough.
To find out more, see: www.globalclimatecampaign.org.
To see what you’re missing on our climate tour, check out: www.youthclimatetour.eu
Towards a New Sustainable Economics
John Nicholls
On October 4th at Leeds Metropolitan University, I attended the Leeds Schumacher Lectures, entitled ‘Transforming the Global Economy: Solutions for a Sustainable World’. The aim of the lectures was to address the issues of economic justice and ecological sustainability posed by the increasing dominance of global corporations in the international economy. The day involved lectures from three high profile speakers with expertise in climate change and economic justice, followed by time for questions and discussion.
Susan George, Chair of the Planning Board of the Transnational Institute, and prominent author and activist in the alter-globalization movement was the opening speaker at the event. She mentioned that the ‘neoliberal’ project, whereby people are encouraged to believe that they have no responsibility for others or the fate of the planet, has resulted in the creation of a ‘triple crisis’, namely the social crisis of poverty and inequality, the financial crisis, and the environmental crisis and threat of species extinction, and remarked that there was no excuse for mass poverty and deprivation today, in a world of such material wealth. She stressed the fact that a reliance on economic growth certainly isn’t the answer ecologically and isn’t even economically as the benefits have been shown to go to the wealthiest portion of society only. She also highlighted the difficult point that localised solutions to dealing with climate change, whilst often preferably, are necessary but tragically insufficient in addressing the issue with the speed required. The need for a ‘New environmental Keynesianism’ of targeted government spending on in renewable energy resources was stressed, as was the idea that such a conversion to a green economy is technically feasible. Other possibilities such as taxes on currency and other financial transactions and cancellation of debt with environmental conditions, and the need for a broad alliance within the global justice movement were mentioned.
The second speaker was Ann Pettifor, executive director of Advocacy International, and leading figure in the Jubilee 2000 debt campaign. She has recently spent time working on her blog, “Debtonation”, which analyses the underlying core issue of debt in the current financial crisis. She has also recently authored a thinkpiece published by the democratic left pressure group Compass, entitled ‘The Credit Crunch and the Green New Deal’. She spoke passionately about the need for an effective understanding of the current crisis amongst activist circles, and an effective response that has environmental sustainability and social justice at its core. She traced the causes of the crisis back to the massive increase in credit that began with the deregulation of the international economy following the collapse of the Bretton Woods system of monetary management in 1971. The led to the development of high levels of inflation in the 1970s, that led to a new system of economic management of ‘monetarism’ from the late 1970s onwards, focusing on the use of interest rates cut backs in government spending to curb inflation, associated with the right-wing governments of Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan. She was keen to stress once again the interlinked nature of the different crises (financial, ecological, social) currently unfolding, something that she suggested hadn’t been understood by the current Labour government. “When Gordon Brown sets up a Climate Change and Energy department and simultaneously appoints Peter Mandelson as Business Minister charged with telling the City of London not to worry about re-regulation, you can tell he hasn’t made the connection”, she said. She suggested the lowering of interest rates as an immediate priority, as part of a longer-term strategy of ‘subordinating finance to the real economy’.
The final speaker was Andrew Simms, Policy Director at the New Economics Foundation and head of the Climate Change programme at the Centre for Global Interdependence. He is also author of, amongst other works, ‘Tescopoly: How One Shop Came Out On Top And Why It Matters.’ He talked about the volatility of the global oil and food distribution networks on a ‘fragile energy edifice’, and the need for a progressive rather than exploitative interdependence between nations. He also talked about the need for effective energy demand management through a ‘Green New Deal’, as well as co-operatives, mutuals and credit unions on a more local scale. An immediate priority for him was the stabilisation of the world’s financial systems, involving the breaking up of discredited institutions, and a clamp down on tax havens. Secondly he stressed the need to raise resources for change, using an oil legacy fund and a recurrent windfall tax on energy companies. He championed the idea of a ‘World Alliance for Decentralised Energy’, creating, above all, the conditions in which ecosystems and the core economy can flourish.
The day was deeply informative and inspiring, and I left wanted to learn more and take action. I hope to take some of the ideas from the sessions into academic learning, and hope to be part of a new movement for a green, sustainable economics: one that puts people and the planet at its very heart.
For more information go to:
www.schumacher-north.co.uk
www.tni.org
www.neweconomics.org
www.debtonation.org
www.advocacyinternational.co.uk
On October 4th at Leeds Metropolitan University, I attended the Leeds Schumacher Lectures, entitled ‘Transforming the Global Economy: Solutions for a Sustainable World’. The aim of the lectures was to address the issues of economic justice and ecological sustainability posed by the increasing dominance of global corporations in the international economy. The day involved lectures from three high profile speakers with expertise in climate change and economic justice, followed by time for questions and discussion.
Susan George, Chair of the Planning Board of the Transnational Institute, and prominent author and activist in the alter-globalization movement was the opening speaker at the event. She mentioned that the ‘neoliberal’ project, whereby people are encouraged to believe that they have no responsibility for others or the fate of the planet, has resulted in the creation of a ‘triple crisis’, namely the social crisis of poverty and inequality, the financial crisis, and the environmental crisis and threat of species extinction, and remarked that there was no excuse for mass poverty and deprivation today, in a world of such material wealth. She stressed the fact that a reliance on economic growth certainly isn’t the answer ecologically and isn’t even economically as the benefits have been shown to go to the wealthiest portion of society only. She also highlighted the difficult point that localised solutions to dealing with climate change, whilst often preferably, are necessary but tragically insufficient in addressing the issue with the speed required. The need for a ‘New environmental Keynesianism’ of targeted government spending on in renewable energy resources was stressed, as was the idea that such a conversion to a green economy is technically feasible. Other possibilities such as taxes on currency and other financial transactions and cancellation of debt with environmental conditions, and the need for a broad alliance within the global justice movement were mentioned.
The second speaker was Ann Pettifor, executive director of Advocacy International, and leading figure in the Jubilee 2000 debt campaign. She has recently spent time working on her blog, “Debtonation”, which analyses the underlying core issue of debt in the current financial crisis. She has also recently authored a thinkpiece published by the democratic left pressure group Compass, entitled ‘The Credit Crunch and the Green New Deal’. She spoke passionately about the need for an effective understanding of the current crisis amongst activist circles, and an effective response that has environmental sustainability and social justice at its core. She traced the causes of the crisis back to the massive increase in credit that began with the deregulation of the international economy following the collapse of the Bretton Woods system of monetary management in 1971. The led to the development of high levels of inflation in the 1970s, that led to a new system of economic management of ‘monetarism’ from the late 1970s onwards, focusing on the use of interest rates cut backs in government spending to curb inflation, associated with the right-wing governments of Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan. She was keen to stress once again the interlinked nature of the different crises (financial, ecological, social) currently unfolding, something that she suggested hadn’t been understood by the current Labour government. “When Gordon Brown sets up a Climate Change and Energy department and simultaneously appoints Peter Mandelson as Business Minister charged with telling the City of London not to worry about re-regulation, you can tell he hasn’t made the connection”, she said. She suggested the lowering of interest rates as an immediate priority, as part of a longer-term strategy of ‘subordinating finance to the real economy’.
The final speaker was Andrew Simms, Policy Director at the New Economics Foundation and head of the Climate Change programme at the Centre for Global Interdependence. He is also author of, amongst other works, ‘Tescopoly: How One Shop Came Out On Top And Why It Matters.’ He talked about the volatility of the global oil and food distribution networks on a ‘fragile energy edifice’, and the need for a progressive rather than exploitative interdependence between nations. He also talked about the need for effective energy demand management through a ‘Green New Deal’, as well as co-operatives, mutuals and credit unions on a more local scale. An immediate priority for him was the stabilisation of the world’s financial systems, involving the breaking up of discredited institutions, and a clamp down on tax havens. Secondly he stressed the need to raise resources for change, using an oil legacy fund and a recurrent windfall tax on energy companies. He championed the idea of a ‘World Alliance for Decentralised Energy’, creating, above all, the conditions in which ecosystems and the core economy can flourish.
The day was deeply informative and inspiring, and I left wanted to learn more and take action. I hope to take some of the ideas from the sessions into academic learning, and hope to be part of a new movement for a green, sustainable economics: one that puts people and the planet at its very heart.
For more information go to:
www.schumacher-north.co.uk
www.tni.org
www.neweconomics.org
www.debtonation.org
www.advocacyinternational.co.uk
No Milk Please, We're Vegan
Livestock and fishing industries are the second biggest source of greenhouse gases: 18% in comparison to 13.5% for all the world’s transport systems. Tony Wardle, Diet of Disaster
While 40 million tonnes of food would eliminate the most extreme cases of world hunger, 540 million tonnes are fed to animals in Western countries every year. www.peta.org.uk
Already I am struggling to remember what the word ‘vegan’ used to mean to me. I do remember wondering who these crazy people were that don’t drink milk. No milk? Why would you do that? Why?
To me, the step from there to where I spend such an inordinate amount of my time saying the word ‘vegan’ that it’s started to lose all meaning whatsoever was not as radical as it must seem to the rest of the world. In fact one spends so much time in one’s vegan bubble that you forget that whilst you gorge yourself of hobnobs, hummus and stuff from skips, the rest of the world goes on thinking that eating meat and dairy is completely logical.
Ahem [clears throat]… it’s not. And it isn’t so much the ridiculous demand that we (although, remember, of course that I am up on my high horse and am therefore exempt from the ‘we’) put on the livestock industry that ever more intensive and nastier farming practices are required to meet it, or that an increasing number of health problems, from heart disease to cancer, are being blamed on the old meat ‘n dairy; it’s the hidden effects that eating cows and drinking their juice is having on the planet and it’s tenants. After all, what’s the point in being nice to animals and being all healthy if the fire and brimstone of climate change means that there won’t be anywhere for them, or us, to live?
You only have to look at the facts to see that the most effective way of lowering your carbon footprint is to turn vegetarian, or even vegan, never mind just taking the bus.
Want less world poverty too? Then stop eating animals, the bulk of whose fodder is grown in countries with the crushing burdens of landlessness, food insecurity and starvation-related diseases, never mind the inefficiency of using valuable water and foodstuffs to keep animals alive while people are starving and thirsty. Suddenly the nut jobs who won’t have milk don’t seem quite so crazy.
While 40 million tonnes of food would eliminate the most extreme cases of world hunger, 540 million tonnes are fed to animals in Western countries every year. www.peta.org.uk
Already I am struggling to remember what the word ‘vegan’ used to mean to me. I do remember wondering who these crazy people were that don’t drink milk. No milk? Why would you do that? Why?
To me, the step from there to where I spend such an inordinate amount of my time saying the word ‘vegan’ that it’s started to lose all meaning whatsoever was not as radical as it must seem to the rest of the world. In fact one spends so much time in one’s vegan bubble that you forget that whilst you gorge yourself of hobnobs, hummus and stuff from skips, the rest of the world goes on thinking that eating meat and dairy is completely logical.
Ahem [clears throat]… it’s not. And it isn’t so much the ridiculous demand that we (although, remember, of course that I am up on my high horse and am therefore exempt from the ‘we’) put on the livestock industry that ever more intensive and nastier farming practices are required to meet it, or that an increasing number of health problems, from heart disease to cancer, are being blamed on the old meat ‘n dairy; it’s the hidden effects that eating cows and drinking their juice is having on the planet and it’s tenants. After all, what’s the point in being nice to animals and being all healthy if the fire and brimstone of climate change means that there won’t be anywhere for them, or us, to live?
You only have to look at the facts to see that the most effective way of lowering your carbon footprint is to turn vegetarian, or even vegan, never mind just taking the bus.
Want less world poverty too? Then stop eating animals, the bulk of whose fodder is grown in countries with the crushing burdens of landlessness, food insecurity and starvation-related diseases, never mind the inefficiency of using valuable water and foodstuffs to keep animals alive while people are starving and thirsty. Suddenly the nut jobs who won’t have milk don’t seem quite so crazy.
Must Have Recipes
The Ultimate Nut Roast
I know it’s a cliché but it’s a useful one to have, and I never get tired of the stuff. Serves 4-6
Basic recipe:
2tbsp olive oil
1 large-ish onion, chopped finely
2 or 3 cloves of garlic chopped or crushed
500g raw carrots, peeled and grated
Chopped peanuts or half a jar of peanut butter
½ a loaf of bread, can be any colour (let’s be inclusive here), stale is best
2 tbsp dried thyme
3 tbsp soy sauce
½ tsp salt
Preheat the oven to 200°C (or just stick it in with whatever else is in there and adjust the cooking time!)
In a large frying pan (I use my wok), soften the onion and the garlic on a medium heat. Add the carrot and cook for another 5 or ten minutes, stirring occasionally.
Take the pan off the heat and add all of the remaining ingredients. The mixture should be a bit sticky, but not wet so you may have to add a little water.
Press the mixture into a baking dish (I use a cake tin and serve it in slices, although you will have to grease the tin with margarine if you want to turn it out) and put in the oven for about half an hour, or until the top goes a bit crispy.
Best served with roasties and gravy! Also brilliant the next day in a sandwich with mustard, although it is unlikely you will have any leftovers, as carnivores seem to enjoy this too.
Variations:
You can use any old veg instead of carrots, as long as it’s grateable (except potato). I’ve used courgette, squash and beetroot before with equally good results.
Use whichever nut you can get most easily or cheaply, depending on your priorities. Pretty much anything will work: try walnuts, or chestnuts for extra Christmassiness. You could even go nut free if you aren’t a nut fan.
You can even add a tin of butter, kidney or haricot beans at the last stage. Or for a Moroccan style roast, add chick peas and replace the thyme with 1 tsp ground coriander and 2tsp cumin seeds.
The Only Sticky Toffee Pudding Recipe You Will Ever Need
Yes, it is vegan, but nobody will know, shhh!
Serves 6
Pudding:
250ml soya milk
100ml water
200g chopped dates
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
115g vegan margarine
115g brown sugar
200g self raising flour
¼ tsp ground nutmeg
¼ tsp ground ginger
¼ tsp ground cinnamon
¼ tsp salt
Sauce:
200g brown sugar
150g vegan margarine
100g golden syrup
Splash of soy milk
Preheat the oven to 180ºC and grease a 20x20cm cake tin or baking dish.
Heat the dates, soy milk and water in a saucepan and simmer until the dates are soft (it only takes a couple of minutes). Take off the heat and add the bicarbonate of soda, which will make it froth up. It’s very exciting.
While it cools down a bit, cream the margarine and sugar together and stir in the fizzy mixture.
Sift in the flour, spices and salt and mix together. Don’t be too enthusiastic. It’s ok to have one or two lumps and over mixing it will stop it from rising.
Pour the mixture into the dish and put it straight in the oven for about half an hour, until a you can stick a knife in and it comes out clean.
Just before it comes out of the oven, make the sauce by melting all of the ingredients except the soy milk in a pan and simmering for 2 or 3 minutes. Take it off the heat and stir in the soy to cool it a tad.
Pour some sauce over each slice of pudding and eat it hot, with vegan custard (just make up Bird’s custard powder with soy milk).
I defy even the most stringent vegaphobe to resist that on any cold, winter day!
I know it’s a cliché but it’s a useful one to have, and I never get tired of the stuff. Serves 4-6
Basic recipe:
2tbsp olive oil
1 large-ish onion, chopped finely
2 or 3 cloves of garlic chopped or crushed
500g raw carrots, peeled and grated
Chopped peanuts or half a jar of peanut butter
½ a loaf of bread, can be any colour (let’s be inclusive here), stale is best
2 tbsp dried thyme
3 tbsp soy sauce
½ tsp salt
Preheat the oven to 200°C (or just stick it in with whatever else is in there and adjust the cooking time!)
In a large frying pan (I use my wok), soften the onion and the garlic on a medium heat. Add the carrot and cook for another 5 or ten minutes, stirring occasionally.
Take the pan off the heat and add all of the remaining ingredients. The mixture should be a bit sticky, but not wet so you may have to add a little water.
Press the mixture into a baking dish (I use a cake tin and serve it in slices, although you will have to grease the tin with margarine if you want to turn it out) and put in the oven for about half an hour, or until the top goes a bit crispy.
Best served with roasties and gravy! Also brilliant the next day in a sandwich with mustard, although it is unlikely you will have any leftovers, as carnivores seem to enjoy this too.
Variations:
You can use any old veg instead of carrots, as long as it’s grateable (except potato). I’ve used courgette, squash and beetroot before with equally good results.
Use whichever nut you can get most easily or cheaply, depending on your priorities. Pretty much anything will work: try walnuts, or chestnuts for extra Christmassiness. You could even go nut free if you aren’t a nut fan.
You can even add a tin of butter, kidney or haricot beans at the last stage. Or for a Moroccan style roast, add chick peas and replace the thyme with 1 tsp ground coriander and 2tsp cumin seeds.
The Only Sticky Toffee Pudding Recipe You Will Ever Need
Yes, it is vegan, but nobody will know, shhh!
Serves 6
Pudding:
250ml soya milk
100ml water
200g chopped dates
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
115g vegan margarine
115g brown sugar
200g self raising flour
¼ tsp ground nutmeg
¼ tsp ground ginger
¼ tsp ground cinnamon
¼ tsp salt
Sauce:
200g brown sugar
150g vegan margarine
100g golden syrup
Splash of soy milk
Preheat the oven to 180ºC and grease a 20x20cm cake tin or baking dish.
Heat the dates, soy milk and water in a saucepan and simmer until the dates are soft (it only takes a couple of minutes). Take off the heat and add the bicarbonate of soda, which will make it froth up. It’s very exciting.
While it cools down a bit, cream the margarine and sugar together and stir in the fizzy mixture.
Sift in the flour, spices and salt and mix together. Don’t be too enthusiastic. It’s ok to have one or two lumps and over mixing it will stop it from rising.
Pour the mixture into the dish and put it straight in the oven for about half an hour, until a you can stick a knife in and it comes out clean.
Just before it comes out of the oven, make the sauce by melting all of the ingredients except the soy milk in a pan and simmering for 2 or 3 minutes. Take it off the heat and stir in the soy to cool it a tad.
Pour some sauce over each slice of pudding and eat it hot, with vegan custard (just make up Bird’s custard powder with soy milk).
I defy even the most stringent vegaphobe to resist that on any cold, winter day!
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