RECYCLED MYTHS OF GOING GREEN
e’re all familiar with greenwashing: the corporate practice of being hugely green on paper, with not much back-up in real terms. And then there’s greenwishing: telling ourselves that the small trendy things we do in the name of greenness (usually requiring little sacrifice or effort) are making a difference and are unquestionably correct.
There’s been so much greenwishing about that there are now battalions of so-called “green” practices floating around which are at best a washedout khaki. If you’re feeling bad because you suspect that you fall horribly short of the green ideal, if the only thing green about you is envy upon watching your neighbours harvest from their bio-dynamic vegetable garden and rake compost, then take heart. Things are not always what they seem.
Take the extreme locavore — possibly also a hipster — who won’t buy anything imported (except for clothing and the new iPhone). This person may have subtly criticised your purchase of beans from Kenya, and you probably bowed your head in shame. No need. Eating local seems intuitively correct. It’s an easy idea to grab onto and ride for dear life. (It works well for industry, too, because the where of a food is much easier to write on a label than the how.) But air-miles, on average, count for less than 10% of a food’s total emissions. Production details make up the rest. This is irritating news for locavores, but it’s the truth. Beans from afar, grown using lowtech methods and natural fertiliser, are probably greener than beans grown around the corner using fossil-fuel fertiliser and a diesel tractor. Local beans sans tractor would be first prize, but you get the point.
Supporting your local economy might be a cool idea, but it depends on what you’re eating. A kilogram of feedlot beef from your own neighbourhood will have roughly 50 times the emissions of a tin of beans shipped from 8 000km away.
This is why flesh eaters are often scorned in the green arena. But don’t be bullied. You aren’t the only one doing everything wrong. I’m talking about those pescetarians (also flesh eaters, but they don’t see it that way) whose greenwishing leads them to conclude that if they simply avoid land animals their eating is positively glowing emerald.
Well, guess what: if said pescetarian eats wild-caught prawns, you may eat (grass-fed) beef in their presence with no shame. The green crimes are different, but equally huge.
For every kilo of wild prawns harvested, up to 15 times the amount of other marine life is caught, killed and thrown back (some studies cite an even higher figure). This includes turtles, dolphins and marine birds.
Not so green now, right? Those other animals are not on the plate, but make no mistake, they’re a part of the prawn curry.
As for the notion that biodegradable packaging actually has a hope in hell of breaking down in the landfills where it ends up, that’s greenwishing with a cherry on top.