Letters: Greed not greens cause hunger | Environment | The Guardian

Excellent letter in The Guardian:

Letters: Greed not greens cause hunger Environment The Guardian

The Channel 4 documentary What the Green Movement Got Wrong (Last night's TV, 5 November) in our view made a series of misguided and inaccurate allegations and assumptions. It identified GM as a solution to hunger and implicated anti-GM campaigners for exacerbating food insecurity. As development organisations, we consider the documentary was extremely biased against environmental organisations that do so much to promote positive solutions. Hunger is a blight on humanity, but it is a political and economic problem. Its root causes include the broken and biased trading system; the bankers who gamble on the price of staple foods; and land grabs by financiers – all of which make food unaffordable for the hungry and deny their right to food.

In our view, the most significant impact that GM companies have made is to dominate the seed chain, selling expensive and patented seeds to farmers, seeds that are used more for livestock feed, cotton and biofuels – not for feeding people. The documentary didn't include any independent voices from civil society in the global south who are campaigning against GM and for local sustainable food production.

Had they done so, it is likely to have become clear that the small-scale farmers who provide food for most people in the world are not calling for GM technologies that are beyond their control. They are calling for political will from governments to take on the corporate lobbyists and protect their land, natural resources and production systems; a fair trading system to ensure fair prices; and a fair hearing from governments and documentary-makers on the future food system.

Deborah Doane World Development Movement
Patrick Mulvany UK Food Group
Andrew Scott Practical Action
John Hilary War on Want

Green tips on the theme of clothes

Copy of a short article to be published in the local newsletter/magazine
'Knowledge', part of the regular 'Green Scene' series I write. This one's on the theme of clothes - topical give my recent blog entry on rising food and clothes prices the other day.

Money-saving, no cost or low cost ideas for being green:

*buy second-hand and where affordable buy clothes made from natural and ecological or recycled materials

*put old clothes to new uses and turn into draft excluders, cleaning rags, a patchwork quilt/blanket, furniture stuffing...

*take old clothes to charity shops and good quality recycling schemes like Oxfam, Scope

*think through what you are buying: Do you really need it? Will the item last well?

*don’t wash clothes at 50 degrees, cut the temperature down to 40 or 30 degrees – some detergents are designed to clean well at even 15 degrees

*think about whether what you are buying has been made by oppressed, abused, extreme low paid, slave and/or child labour – ask shops questions and if they don’t satisfy you then buy elsewhere

Food and clothes prices: much more than narrow economics

For me there has never been any such thing as cheap food and clothes because someone or something, somewhere is paying the costs or suffering the consequences of 'low' prices such as in our supermarkets...joined up, systems, thinking shows this. However, even those who have formerly had other perspectives are increasingly saying that the era of 'cheap' food and clothes is over (see the link to the Daily Express article and Primark comments below).

Fascinating interview on Radio 4 today about this (see link below). World demand for meat is up and so is demand for wheat and other grains to feed the animals, land that could or did grow food is being taken for energy crops or other purposes, human population is rising, climate change is cutting yields in key locations - factors like these are increasing demand whilst also lowering supply and that means the dominant overall trend in food prices over time is definitely upwards. Adopting greener lifestyles would over time moderate the upward prices trend.

BBC News - Today - 'Upward long-term food cost trend'

The rising cotton and food prices are driving fears that our weekly shopping could soon become more expensive.

Natalie Berg from the research group Planet Retail examines whether consumers would have to bear the brunt or whether companies would be able to absorb any price rise.

See also:

http://www.dailyexpress.co.uk/posts/view/199383

Supporting fairtrade

'If you are elected as an MP on May the 6th, would you, in principle, support the continued growth of Fairtrade in the UK?' *YES - and in practice too (see here)!!

I feel very strongly about this - and I'm sure you are not surprised to hear that it is natural Green territory to work for 'better prices, decent working conditions, local sustainability, and fair terms of trade for farmers and workers in the developing world...requiring companies to pay sustainable prices (which must never fall lower than the market price),...address[ing] the injustices of conventional trade, which traditionally discriminates against the poorest, weakest producers...enabl[ing] them to improve their position and have more control over their lives.' See http://www.fairtrade.org.uk/

____________________________________________________

Dear Mr Vowles,

I am aware you must be very busy these days, but as we approach the general election I would like to ask for two minutes of your time to answer one simple question:

If you are elected as an MP on May the 6th, would you, in principle, support the continued growth of Fairtrade in the UK?

A simple yes or no answer would be very useful. [*see above!]

Of course we would also welcome any additional thoughts or comments you'd like to provide regarding Fairtrade!

Please respond to the following e-mail adress:
election2010@fairtrade.org.uk

Many thanks,
Toby Quantrill
Head of Public Policy,
Fairtrade Foundation