I still buy a number of these things, but certain things
have changed; and in a way that I hope will be more sustainable. Here’s how:
·
I no longer buy lettuce in a bag (or otherwise).
The lettuce plants in the pot garden have grown large and gorgeous and when we
want to use them we just go outside with a bowl and take as much as we want off
the plant. And it tastes so much
better
·
We buy far less produce at the supermarket. We
have an Oooby box of fresh, local and often organic produce delivered to our
house once a week (and in a recycled cardboard box, so no plastic).
·
Before going to the supermarket on a Sunday, I
stop in at Huckleberry Farms,
an organic supermarket in Green Lane where I top up on fruit and often buy
rice, flour, rolled oats, seeds, spices and organic tinned products.
·
I don’t buy breakfast cereal any more, I make my
own granola with organic rolled oats and bush honey (both from Huckleberry
farms). Many of the nuts and fruit in it are supermarket products, but this
still creates less packaging a lot of the time.
·
I don’t buy yoghurt anymore, I make my own (also
out of a packets, but I get more yoghurt and a smaller quantity of the eternal
wrapping).
·
I bake bread at home so buy fewer packaged
loaves. I also try to use organic flour.
·
I’m vegetarian now, but the Boyfriend is not,
which means that we buy far less meat. He is also eating a number of vegetarian
meals with me so we have cut our meat consumption by more than half.
·
The herb garden is getting healthier every day
so we don’t need to buy supermarket packaged herbs anymore. I’ve even started drying
out herbs we have large crops of.
·
My tomatoes will be ready to harvest soon and
the broccoli isn’t far behind.
·
I’m also discovering the joys of farmer’s
markets. There is a French Market in Parnell with amazing bread, dips, cider,
produce, cheese which I all locally made. We try to go there where we can.
·
I’m phasing out commercial cleaning products where
possible. For instance, I just made a spray cleaner out of washing soda and
water. It works a dream and it probably cost me about 30c to make.
Some of this is time consuming, for sure. My shopping trips
are longer. I have to stop whatever I’m doing about once a week and make a
batch of granola and a loaf of bread but I did buy a bread maker. Gardening
takes time, watering the garden takes time, especially in this hot weather, but
I usually water the garden after I’ve had a run so both me and the plants get
to cool down at the same time. Making cleaning products also takes time and so
does sourcing some of the things you need to make them. I spent at least ten
minutes walking up and down the supermarket aisle looking for washing soda the
other week.
All in all, I think I’m starting to do OK. Well, sort of.My decisions on how to best protect the environment are not necessarily based on stringent research and an extensive knowledge of such things. I try, but frankly I don’t have time to do a PhD on the subject and even if I did I wouldn’t necessarily be right in my final conclusions, I’d be one more voice adding to the academic fray on sustainability. It’s a scientific minefield because no one seems to agree on very much at all. Of course when you think about it that’s not surprising. The rapid and irreparable destruction of the environment is a fairly recent thing and modern farming practices are always evolving. We don’t know what human-induced climate change will do to us because it hasn’t happened before and we don’t really know at what point the total destruction of the planet will have been achieved – it might have happened already. We are still coming to terms with what sustainable practices really work the best.
One thing I’ve found considerable debate around is the
environmental benefits of organic farming. It seems logical that it should be
better for the environment. In New Zealand, for instance, we know that our
rivers are being polluted by nitrogen-based fertilisers. I even remember having
it explained to me when I was very young: nitrogen is washed into a body of
water, water weeds start to grow prolifically and they strangle oxygen out of
the water making life often impossible for creatures that live there. If you
want to see just how bad things can get, I recommend watching Restoring
the Mauri of Lake Omapere. It’s brilliant and very sad. If organic
farming is kinder to our bodies of water then I think it had to be a good
thing.
The chairman of Organics Aotearoa, Dereck
Broadmore agrees, as one would expect. This link on his name will take you
to an interesting piece of writing arguing for organics and it certainly is not kind to nitrogen-based fertilisers. I
do find the idea that fossil fuels are behind modern soil enriching a
frightening thought.
But then, this
article in the Independent gave
me something to think about too. Rob Johnson comments that ‘A litre of organic milk requires 80 per cent more land
than conventional milk to produce, has 20 per cent greater global warming
potential, releases 60 per cent more nutrients to water sources, and
contributes 70 per cent more to acid rain.’
I’m sure he’s not making
it all up. Unless he has some hidden agenda. I think the more rational
explanation is that organic farming, like most things, has its pros and cons.
It would seem sensible to
me if some things were best to buy organic and maybe some things weren’t. If
you try to look up ‘most important organic foods’ on Google, however, you’ll
get a long list foods that are more likely to infect you with pesticides because we eat the skin. I don’t actually give
a rat’s arse about what I consume. I
want to know what works best for the planet. Well, not completely true. I care
a bit about what I consume – but it does seem that organic produce isn’t a way
to avoid pesticide because it uses it. Just different ones. A
University of Guleph study even found out that some organic pesticides are
more harmful than conventional ones.
So could the organics
industry be a way to make consumers part with more money for the same products?
I don’t believe that and I think there are many compelling cases for organic
farming. For instance, look at the article on this Trinity
College Dublin research. Increased insect diversity has got to be good.
I think I can only make
up my mind after more research. In the meantime I’ll continue to mix my organic
shopping with the regular. If you can’t decide you might as well cover all your
bases.
I do want to read this
book: http://www.dw.de/dw/article/0,,15393108,00.html
And articles like this
are very interesting: http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-national/tp-andhrapradesh/article2922493.ece
You know what I’ve
learned from this? We don’t actually know very much. We are always being caught
between differing opinions, media hype and even very qualified people who may
or may not have a marketing agenda whether they even know it or not. It happened with smoking so why not one
side or another of the organics debate?
But until I learn
differently I’m going to persist with buying organic where I can afford to.
Some things aren’t that much more expensive and the apples definitely taste better.
I’m sorry if this hasn’t
been a well-informed or decisive commentary on organic products. I'm not qualified to make one of those and I know that. I’ve wanted to
try to find out about it as a regular person without much knowledge using research tools that
most people have access too – like Google. I personally think the organics
debate might work best if we avoided talking about it as a whole and started
looking more at individual crops and individual practices. It actually doesn’t
make sense if an entire type of agriculture is all good or all bad like a character in a Hollywood movie. This is Earth, not Middle Earth and it's a land of ambiguity not orcs and elves and black and white.