You are The System

by Matt DeNoto

Corporations are scary things. Mindless, soulless profit machines that want above all else growth. They’re a bit like the viruses of the financial world, and for the last few decades they’ve been getting their way. Profit and growth have been priority number one, with everything else a distant second, including treating their employees fairly and taking environmental responsibility. They are powerful, and their power makes them extremely intimidating. It often seems futile to try and beat the system.

But corporations are ultimately controlled by people. And that may be their saving grace.

An idea came to me as I read about the recent Chevron shareholder’s meeting, where a small but passionate group of environmental activists tried to bring about change in Chevron’s policies, particularly regarding the legal suit Chevron is fighting in Ecuador over the pollution committed by Texaco, which Chevron acquired in 2001.

Unfortunately, as has traditionally been the case, the great majority of shareholders do not care about Chevron’s pollution in Ecuador and they do not care about Chevron’s commitment to human rights. They care only about the pieces of paper they own labeled ‘shares,’ and how much money those pieces of paper are worth. Anything which might lessen the value of those pieces of paper, be it the cost of cleaning up years worth of sludge poured into the water supply of an innocent village or acknowledging the environmental impact of current practices, is considered to be unacceptable. Shareholders, by and large, have no emotional stake in a company. They do not care if it does business fairly, or if it produces goods the world truly needs in a responsible manner. It’s all about those little pieces of paper.

The thing about it is, anyone can buy shares in a company. I began to imagine a movement whereby responsibly minded individuals banded together, chose a corporation in need of a reality check, and began purchasing shares of said corporation en masse. It might be difficult for the group to acquire a majority ownership, but simply the influence that might be exerted by a group not focused solely on profits could have a very interesting impact on the concept of a corporation as we know it.

Corporations are very good at making profits. And that’s okay. We want them to be able to make profits. We need companies to provide goods and services. We need them to compete and to innovate.

And we need them to take responsibility for their actions. We need them to stop fighting tooth and nail every time they’re forced to clean up a mess they’ve made, and then we need to put in place a system that encourages them not to make any messes in the first place. We need corporations to equate making money with making the world a better place.

We can do it. We can change the system. We are the system.

In case you’re feeling inspired, the web address www.environmentalshareholders.com is available for purchase.

please make Mc-D’s a Mc-Don’t

Seriously.  SERIOUSLY.

After you read this, if you need further proof that the agri-business, fast food, triple hamburger on every corner industry is not serving your best interest… well then, I hate to say it, but there is no hope for you.

McDonald’s Aims for a Low-Pesticide Potato for Its French Fries, via Reuters.

McDonald’s, the largest fast-food chain the world and the largest buyer of potatoes in the United States, is under pressure from shareholders to do something about pesticide use on the potatoes it buys. To avoid a shareholder resolution on the subject, McDonald’s has agreed to “survey its U.S. suppliers compile a list of best practices in pesticide reduction and recommend those best practices to its global suppliers.

Essentially, three major shareholders was threatening to demand that McDonald’s reduce its purchasing of pesticide laden potatoes.  But, since corporate decided to look into it on their own, it is not a “requirement”, as much as it is a, “it would be nice if you were to do this, please.”

First off, yummy to the pesticide filled french fries you all have been ingesting, unknowingly.

Second, just some information:

Potatoes have been on or near the list of the Environmental Working Group’s dirty dozen foods with the most pesticide residue for years. That means, according to a government analysis, that after a typical person buys a typical potato and prepares it in a typical way, it’s among the fruits and vegetables most likely to be laced with pesticides.

“Farmers often spray on a weekly basis, or even more frequently to try to prevent blight. They also spray herbicides to kill the tops of the plants at the end of the growing season to make the underground tubers easier to harvest. Over 40 toxic pesticides are used on potatoes including ethoprop, mancozeb, chlorothalonil, EPTC and metribuzin.

Most of these pesticides are linked to serious chronic effects such as cancer, endocrine disruption and reproductive/developmental effects. Many leach to groundwater and contaminate surface waters. Intensive potato cultivation and pesticides usage have been implicated in the high rates of rare cancers in young children in rural western Prince Edward Island (PEI), Canada. The island farming community of about 14,000 has experienced occurrences of osteosarcoma, several lymphomas, Ewing’s sarcoma, and a number of myeloid leukemia cases, all among children.”

So, the good news is that McDonald’s is under pressure to put its growers under pressure.  And, they are in a position to do that, since they buy a lot of potatoes.  The bad news.. is it too little too late?  And, pressure is one thing, demanding is another.

watch the video

I posted a new video today in the homepage section.  It is a great interview with Simon Johnson who is an economist and professor at MIT.  

I think it is avery interesting perspective about our economy and what we as citizens need to be aware of and how we can demand that something change.  

I could only link the first ten minutes, but you can follow the video to YouTube for the last ten minutes or go to Bill Moyer’s site directly, HERE.

it is real, you know….

 

A new poll done by the Pew Research Center shows a trend that, if continued, does not bode well for the planet.  When people were asked what they were concerned with in the United States, the environment was at the very bottom of the list.  (The top priorities included domestic policy and economy.)

The study showed that 30% of Americans feel that global warming is a top priority.  Protecting the environment had the sharpest decline to 41%, which was a 15% decline in a one year period of time.  It should also be noted that the disparity between Republicans and Democrats was quite large.  In fact, where 50% of Democrats felt that protecting the environment and global warming were a priority, only 20% of Republicans felt the same way.

These priorities are slightly at odds with the Presidents agenda, as he has placed the environment as a top priority of his administration.  However, many have high hopes that Obama can tie in conservation, efficiency and renewable energy to jobs and sustainable economic future for the company, essentially hitting two birds with one stone.

What this also is an indication of, however, is that science is not doing its job in effectively communicating the severity of global warming and the environment to the public.  While another survey of 3500 scientists all confirm the global warming is real and a result of humans (via CNN), it seems that the smaller percentage that claims it is false get more press and seem more convincing.

The problem is that if when those non-believing scientists are proved emphatically wrong, it may well be too late.  Many already feel that we have crossed a tipping point of no return.  The disservice of this news is that it can have the potential of making people lazy and revert back to bad habits, because they feel hopeless and out of control in the situation.  

The best way to solve this issue is to help the general public understand the science behind global warming so they have no doubt that it is real and their daily activities have a global impact.  If people know what to do and can track the positive impact that it creates, they will be more likely to continue those behaviors and we may have a fighting chance.

recession… good?

Over the last few weeks, there has been report after report on how the recession is going to be bad for the “green” movement. Slate magazine begs to disagree.

The Green House: The recession is the best thing that could have happened to Barack Obama.

The feeling amongst many is that Obama believes that the “green” movement and setting the economy back on track go hand in hand. By tackling things like the infrastructure and energy, there is a double benefit of saving money due to efficiency, while also creating “green jobs” and getting people employed, again.

Newly Nobel-ed economist Paul Krugman has taken the lead in arguing that “the usual rules of economic policy no longer apply.” Normally, if you wanted to retrofit a building or weatherize a home, you’d have to get the money from somewhere. The usual way is to increase revenues or reduce spending. No longer. With the economy in freefall and interest rates as low as they can go, the only hope for recovery is to spend—and to err on the side of spending too much.

The best part: Even though we have to borrow money, eventually the government can pay itself back by printing more. Yes, that would devalue the currency and therefore would not be, to use a technical economic term, free. But the way Dean Baker of the Center for Economic and Policy Research sees it, we have to spend the money now, anyway, to stimulate the economy: “It’s like what Keynes said: Even if we pay people to dig holes and fill them up again, it’s still good.” And if we’re going to spend, we might as well spend on something that’s going to save us—both economically and environmentally—in the long term.

The argument against all of this… spending more and deflating the value of the dollar may lead the way to the Amero and there is always the backlash of a growing economy hurting the green movement.

You can read the article from Slate Magazine, HERE

holiday gift suggestions, day 1

It is the time of year where we spend a lot of money buying gifts for friends and family. It is a practice that I don’t necessarily support, but I figure if you are going to do it, you might as well make it something that helps us and not hurts us. Therefore, I will be giving daily suggestions for things you can buy your friends and family this holiday season.

GREEN DIMES

Give the gift of less junk mail. Seriously, who wouldn’t want that. It is $20 for a whole year, so it is affordable, as well.

What happens? You submit a name and address and let them know what you would like to keep getting (mainly for catalogs). They use that information to contact anyone and everyone and get the name off of mailing lists, effectively, stopping the waste of junk mail. In fact, they guarantee 90% of your junk mail will be stopped. And, if that isn’t reason enough… they also plant FIVE trees in your name.

I mean… come on! What a gift. This literally is the gift that keeps on giving. At least… in terms of oxygen!

So… if you have employees, service providers, neighbors or the like, that you want to give something to, but are just not sure what… sign them up for Green Dimes

i really don’t know what to think

Lately, I have been reading a lot about Wal-Mart’s to be a more sustainable company; switching to CFL’s, lowering air conditioning, new buildings being LEED certified, and the list really does go on and on.

I just read an article about Wal-Mart’s Personal Sustainability Project (PSP). It is program where employees are encouraged to live a more sustainable life, even going so far as ‘vowing” to do something, or not do something.

Since 2007, all Wal-Mart employees in the US have been asked to take a simple, concrete step to benefit their health, their local community, or the earth. PSP pledges, which can involve work or home life or both, have included vows to drive the speed limit (to save gas), clean up trash, quit smoking, switch to a reusable bottle, or turn off the tap when toothbrushing.

Wal-Mart has reported that 45% of its employees enrolled in the program, and this is with no financial incentive to them. However, maybe there should be? In many cases employees have found things that the stores can do to improve their sustainability (i.e., turning off lights in the breakroom). These changes have saved the company over $1Million dollars.

The criticism is that yes, these employees are doing this on their own, as encouraged by the company. But, the company has a long history of demanding things from their employees without any gain to the employee. So, do you praise the company for implementing green initiatives or do you criticize the company for bullying its staff to change how they live without any benefit except they don’t get fired?

It is an interesting debate. I, personally, have had trouble with ‘ends justify the means’ attitude. We saw with gas prices, that when the cost was high, people were trying to incorporate ‘green’ ideas to keep the personal cost low. Now that prices have gone back down, they are back in their SUV’s having not learned a thing about being sustainable.

I think we will see more and more of this in many other companies, with many more examples. It will be interesting to see what effect it has….

You can find the article HERE, via MotherJones.

good news

In a new poll taken by WorldPublicOpinion.org, participants support green energy even if it meant higher costs.

“People perceive that oil is running out and that it is necessary to take steps right away to replace it as a source of energy,” Steven Kull, director of WorldPublicOpinion.org, told IPS. “They really think in the long run.”

An average of 77 percent of respondents thought policy-makers should require utilities to invest more in alternative energy, with country results ranging from 50 percent support in Russia to 89 percent in South Korea.

With an average agreement of 74 percent, almost the same enthusiasm was shown for greater efforts to make buildings more energy efficient. The lowest support, 54 percent, was found in the Palestinian Territories, while an overwhelming 89 percent of French and British want to see stronger commitments by their governments.

There were 21,000 respondents from 21 countries. I think this shows how the tides are turning.

The article came via IPS and can be found HERE

zimbabwe

A few articles have been released in the last day or two about the terrible situation in Zimbabwe.

MSNBC has a report, “If you rest, you starve”, in which it illustrates how the political climate has left people starving and scavenging for food.

The food crisis began after 2000, when Mugabe launched an often violent campaign to seize white-owned farms and give them to veterans of his guerrilla war against white rule over the former British colony.

Officials from Mugabe’s party toured the Doma district recently and told the new farm owners that the government could not supply their needs. They were advised to make do with what seed they had left, and with animal manure for fertilizer.

On top of that, in another article, Killer Disease hits Zimbabwe, shows how there is a cholera epidemic due to lack of clean water and poorly maintained sewage treatment.

And as the political and economic crisis in Zimbabwe deepens, most hospitals have been forced to close their doors as they can no longer afford drugs, equipment or to pay their staff.

It is expected to get worse due to the start of the rainy season.

I think that the lesson to be learned is that, sadly, we are going to be hearing more and more of these kind of tales. There is enough food, but because of economy and politics it can’t get to the right places. As a result there is a rampant epidemic of a preventable disease.

Sad. So sad.

vroom, vroom

When many of us think about what we can do about climate change, we go to obvious: lightbulbs, recycle, bring a bag, short shower. We demand of our government to invest in clean energy and protect lands.

However, in light of the rumblings of a auto industry bailout, I think an article from The Economist, is an important read: A Survey of Cars in Emerging Markets

We forget that with a growing population comes a growing demand for goods and the infrastructure to match. So what is going to happen when more people want more cars?

…the IMF have calculated that the number of cars worldwide will grow from 600m in 2005 to 2.9 billion in 2050. By 2030, they believe, China’s car fleet will have overtaken America’s (which itself will have increased by 60%), and by 2050 China will have almost as many cars as the entire world has today. India will be catching up fast, with a fleet of 367m, 45 times the number on its congested roads today.

Cars made up an estimated 6.3% of all global emissions in 2000. Eight years later, you know that number is higher and climbing.

This is why it is so important for a green initiative to be built into any auto bailout that either the Bush or Obama Adminstrations would consider. If the estimated car purchase growth becomes reality without a major push to reduce emissions and create fuel efficient, hybrid, or electric cars, we can assume that any net positive effect in other green initiatives will be negated due to autos, alone.

In a way, we should hope for a continued rise in fuel prices, so the desire to own an automobile is lessened.

Read the article, it is very interesting.

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