In Paris this month more than 100,000 people poured into the streets to demand climate action. The city’s largest-ever climate march was taking place while across town a group of gilets jaunes – the protest group known for their hi-vis vests – were engaging in some of the worst violence of their entire three month revolt against declining wages, rising inequality and other consequences of globalisation.

The division between those demanding social justice and climate justice fits neatly with a widely-held view of the gilets jaunes as opposed to climate action. The initial protests were sparked by a rise in diesel tax, which would have cut pollution but landed the cost on drivers. This was too much for those living in poor neighbourhoods, isolated by cuts to public transport.

The narrative that this amounts to a popular rejection of efforts to fight global warming, has been amplified internationally, most prominently by US president Donald Trump. But amid the well-heeled climate marchers was a significant scattering of the distinctive vests. In the Place de la République, François Boulot walked out to address the crowd wearing his yellow gilet.

Ephemeral agora

“The social and ecological emergencies are inseparable: the fight against the end of the world and the end of the month are the same. We will not be able to operate the ecological transition without an equitable wealth redistribution,” said Boulot, who has been a prominent figure in the gilets jaunes. “How can you impose another tax on people already rummaging the bins to feed themselves?”

Rather than recoiling from climate action in the face of the gilets jaunes, France is reckoning with what fair climate policy looks like and how it is decided.

President Emmanuel Macron, the unifying object of ire for his top-down style of governing, has attempted to defuse the protests, first by dropping the tax, then, when that had no effect by convening a national ‘grand debate’ on four controversial issues: one of them the ecological transition. The series of town hall events ended on Friday.

Meanwhile, for 18 consecutive Saturdays, the gilets jaunes have occupied over 30,000 roundabouts across the country, erecting makeshift sheds in which political opinions are traded back and forth.

A week before the climate march, at one of those ephemeral agora on the Champs-Élysées, Jerôme Rodriguez watches as police wheel water cannons into the square. Two powerful jets gush on to a small crowd under the Arc de Triomphe.

Farmer’s cap

“Come on jackets! Time to go home now,” Rodriguez grins, a pair of sunglasses masking the eye he lost in the protests.

For this self-styled figurehead of the gilets, the climate issue is “not the priority”. Protestors are focused on full fridges and “dignified life”, he says.

“Eventually, when we obtain the first things, ecology will have its place, because kids talk a lot about it, and we have been told about it our whole lives. But nowadays, people aren’t concentrated on this. It’s a shame, of course. But we need to get them to live well so that we can interest them in the project,” Rodriguez says.

This is not entirely supported by data. The French Institute of National Opinion (IFOP) found 85% of lower professional categories (employees and workers) and 83% of the non-working population are worried about global warming. Young people are marginally more concerned about the issue, according to a different survey.

A group of women walk by wearing badges demanding climate justice. Meanwhile, Rodriguez, whose celebrity within the movement is obvious, is surrounded by a cluster of pensioners, an elderly woman in a motor wheelchair festooned with bags and a man wearing a farmer’s cap.

His carpet

The average age of the gilets jaunes is 45, according to recent analysis, and they are predominantly working to lower middle class and lean to the political left. For more than half of the participants, the movement represents their first political action.

If there is one thing that unites the gilets jaunes, it is the sense that responsibility for change lies with those at the top of society and government: “Plus de banquise, moins de banquiers” (More ice sheets, less bankers) is one of the many slogans associated with the movement. Macron, a former banker who has fashioned an image abroad as a defender of the Paris climate deal with his catchphrase ‘make our planet great again’, is a symbol of wasteful, hypocritical consumption at home.

“Ask Macron when he travels by plane, plus all of the cars that follow him,” Rodriguez says. “And that guy tells us: ‘Be careful’”.

“Not to mention his tableware, his bread and all of that!” another protestor Sylvain yells.

“And his carpet!” another calls out. (Macron and his wife Brigitte reportedly spent tens of thousands of euros on cutlery at the Élysée Palace and €300,000 on a new carpet.)

Building bridges

Marie-Claire, a pensioner who did not wish to give her family name, says: “You know, people who live precariously, they’ve made ecological efforts before the capitalists. Because they’ve already made efforts not to consume electricity.

“Not to consume too much water. You know, there are people who do not iron their clothes, because it costs too much electricity. I’ve known that, and my daughter does not iron her laundry. Children take a five minute shower. We were ecologists well before anyone else.”

“The real polluters, who are they?” Akli, also a pensioner, bounces back. “We forbid old cars. But we leave Ubers and big Lamborghini to circulate. The jet setters, the cargo ships, we allow them to burn heavy petrol. No one comes to ask them to burn anything else but fossil fuels.”

One manifesto has been widely circulated by the gilets jaunes, calling for among other things, increased building insulation and an aviation fuel tax. But the movement has yet to adopt a coherent programme or set of goals.

Because of this any snapshot of the gilets jaunes is bound to fail to grasp the full picture. Other prominent figures are building bridges with environmentalists.

Ecological justice

Priscillia Ludovsky, whose petition opposing fuel price hikes attracted more than one million signatures and catalysed the movement, has joined with Cyril Dion, a figurehead of the environmental movement, to urge Macron to meet a series of demands, such as a reduced VAT on organic produce and heftier taxes on polluting companies.

Mostly, the gilets jaunes shunned Macron’s Grand Debat, meaning that the two conversations, one encouraging a dialogue with established institutions and the other rejecting the president’s authority, have mostly run in parallel. Occasionally they have crossed over, with some gilets jaunes participating in the state’s fora.

Rodriguez says Macron’s forum is “just about getting more information so that he can sell us his electoral programme – which we don’t want. We can organise very well by ourselves, we can carry out debates. See, we’re debating today.”

The sense that the state is not listening has led to calls for a citizen’s referendum initiative (RIC), under which citizens would take an active role in the formulation of laws. This would, advocates say, ensure that the interests of the people are represented even as the climate crisis is addressed.

“The gilets jaunes, whether you like it or not, have succeeded where 30 years of social battles have failed: putting the question of social justice at the centre of the debate,” philosopher Pierre Dardot and sociologist Christian Laval, wrote in December: “Better, they have posed a fundamental question for humanity about the link between social justice and ecological justice.”

Far from the protests pouring cold water on the issue, suddenly, it seems all of France is talking about climate change.

This Article

This Article first appeared on Climate Home News.   

The Swedish mining conglomerate Boliden began shipping toxic waste from its Rönnskärs smelter to my home town, Arica, in northern Chile in the mid-1980s, when we lived under the rule of general Augusto Pinochet.

Boliden could have chosen to store the material in Sweden, and they claim that it would have been cheaper for them to do so. Instead, they shipped it halfway around the world in a deal with the now defunct Chilean mining company Promel S.A.

The terms of Boliden’s deal with Promel are unclear. Boliden claims that Promel purchased the smelter sludge from them with a view to reselling extracted products.

Deemed unsafe

However, an EU Parliamentary report on corporate human rights abuses states “it is an undisputed fact that Boliden paid Promel 10 million SEK (approx. 1 million euro) for taking care of the sludge”.

What is clear though, is that Promel ultimately failed to process the vast majority of the smelter sludge, and nearly 20,000 tonnes, containing arsenic, mercury, lead and other heavy metals, were abandoned on the outskirts of our city. The waste pile lay uncovered for years.

There is some dispute about the proximity of the waste material to residential housing at the time it was initially received by Promel, but there is agreement, at least, that as our city grew, the dump site became a playground for local children.

By 1998, the Chilean government estimated that approximately 5,000 people had been exposed to dangerous toxins, and in 2009 it identified an array of illnesses and health conditions within our community, including cancers, birth defects, high rates of miscarriage and neurological disorders.

Today, an estimated 12,000 of my fellow citizens have been affected, part of the area has been deemed unsafe for habitation and a large-scale evacuation plan has been initiated by the Chilean government.

Toxic sludge

A legal action brought against Boliden by 796 Arica residents, a fraction of those affected, is now before the appeal court in Umeå, Sweden. The case is a technical one, and the outcome may well hinge upon the residents’ ability to establish a causal link between heightened levels of arsenic in their bodies and the exported smelter sludge.

In March 2018, a District Court in Sweden concluded that the victims had failed to establish that link, although went on to find it “remarkable and negligent of Boliden to have continued the relationship with Promel after realizing any exported waste would end up in an uncovered pile in close proximity to already populated areas – despite knowing this would never be acceptable in Sweden.”

On March 27th of this year, the decision of a Swedish Appeal Court will be issued, and the victims here in Arica will finally learn the outcome of their long fight for justice in the country where their nightmare began.

The export may well have been conducted in accordance with laws in operation at the time. That is a question for the lawyers.

Whether or not Boliden wins the legal argument, however, it is difficult to see how they can win the moral one. After all, they do not contest that they chose to export toxic sludge to Chile rather than deal with it themselves.

Leaked memo

In a now infamous leaked internal memo, Lawrence Summers, chief economist to the World Bank, stated the economic case for the global waste trade: “I think the economic logic behind dumping a load of toxic waste in the lowest wage country is impeccable and we should face up to that…”

Richard Denniss, chief economist to the Australia Institute, writes that “[s]ince toxic waste will inevitably make someone sick, we might as well make poor people sick, as doing so will minimize the amount of ‘foregone earnings’…[and]…[i]f it takes years for some pollutants to make us sick, why not dump pollution in countries where people don’t live long enough to get sick from the pollution?”

The trade in hazardous waste – whether conducted lawfully or otherwise – exposes impoverished communities such as ours to the risk of devastating harm. Developed countries produce 90 percent of the world’s hazardous waste and are best resourced to ensure that the waste is dealt with safely and responsibly at home.

So is it acceptable for a wealthy western corporation or consumer to look to the developing world as a site for the disposal of its effluent?

E-waste

Maybe the tide of the toxic waste trade is turning. Efforts are currently underway at the UN to draft a treaty that would enable corporations to be held accountable for any human rights abuses and environmental damage that arise within the context of their overseas operations.

The potential costs of legal liability in such circumstances may be a risk factor enough to swing the “economic logic” back in favor of domestic processing and disposal.

A proposed amendment to the Basel Convention – the international treaty that regulates the movement of hazardous materials between nation states – would render the transfer of toxic waste from the developed to the developing world unlawful.

It needs just two more states to sign for it to enter into legal force. NGOs such as the Basel Action Network continue their work to highlight, name and shame unlawful shipments, pressuring States to do more to control illegal exports.

In the meantime, states that have long been targets for the disposal of the West’s hazardous waste materials are closing their doors to imports. China no longer accepts plastic or e-waste, and Thailand, Malaysia and Vietnam are also acting to stem the flow to their shores.

Dumping ground

The European Environmental Bureau (EEB), the largest network of environmental citizens’ organisations in Europe, has written a letter in support of the Chilean victims which was recently presented to the Swedish Embassy in Chile along with a petition signed by 2700 residents from the affected area.

The EEB made four demands to the Swedish government: that a Swedish government representative based in Chile visit the affected site and meet victims of the environmental pollution; that the government work with the affected community in the development and delivery of an effective healthcare programme that will respond to the harms suffered;  that the government pay reparations to the community in recognition of the its role in permitting the export of the toxic waste from Sweden to Chile; and to repatriate the waste, in order that it can be adequately and safely processed in Sweden.

So where does all of this leave us, the people of Arica? Boliden no longer exports its waste and is currently constructing an underground storage facility to contain similar waste.

The storage conditions of the waste in Arica would not be considered acceptable in the West – and yet staggeringly, over 30 years after it arrived, the toxic waste is still here in Chile.

It stands as a daily affront to our community. Boliden refuses to take it back.

We did not ask for it to be brought here. We are not the West’s dumping ground.

This Author

Rodrigo Pino Vargas is a representative and campaigner on behalf of affected people in Arica. He is working with the community to establish a foundation to provide long-term legal support and healthcare for victims and their families.

Amid turbulent political times, the shaky coalition between Brexit factions within the Labour Party is given much attention.

Relevant though this may be, another strategic divide held together within Labour is far more important beyond the Brexit moment. Although it rarely plays out in the public sphere, competing strategic priorities around climate change could have a far more significant impact on Labour’s ability to deliver a transformative economic program in government.

The most striking example of this divide played out around the vote on Heathrow expansion in June 2018. Unite lobbied hard for Labour MPs to back the expansion while Labour members and MPs with roots in the climate movement felt the free vote afforded to Labour MPs a travesty.

In reality, the vote was indicative of a schism over climate that should never have been allowed to develop in the labour movement. At the time I argued the dichotomy between jobs and climate is counter-productive for both. Its time to work together heal that divide.

Environmental justice

The Green New Deal has been successful in defining mainstream debate around climate change in the US in recent months because of its power as a framework in making our response climate, economic and social crises inseparable.

In the popular imagination, there no longer needs to be a trade off between transitioning our economy from fossil fuels to renewables and a good standard of living for all.

In fact, the Green New Deal helps us understand that only through a transformative program of investment to fully decarbonise the entire economy can we secure a prosperous future for the many.

At present, Labour’s environmental policy platform The Green Transformation is a mixture of radical ambition and pragmatic compromise underpinned by a powerful justice-oriented narrative. Labour will ban fracking; create 400,000 green jobs across the country; invest £2.3bn to insulate homes; expand public transport by bringing rail back into public ownership, fare caps and electrification; ensure UK aid does not support fossil fuel projects; and promote UK Export Finance support for the energy sector towards low-carbon projects.

For all of these positives, Labour’s target of 60 percent renewables within 12 years of government pales in comparison to the need for 100 per cent renewables by 2030; they are yet to commit to banning all new fossil fuels and fully transitioning away from oil, gas & coal; there is no discussion of reigning in private finance over their support for fossil fuel companies; airport expansion is not ruled out; and, overall, the scale of investment need to upgrade energy infrastructure, guarantee a green job for all and equitably re-industrialise every part of the country is just not there.

Policy formation

The Labour Party is regularly chastised for its shortcomings on climate both within and outside the party. As outlined above, these criticisms aren’t misguided.

However, Labour is a democratic party with a mass membership. It also happens to be the only party representing the interests of the majority of our society with a strong chance of entering government at the next general election.

It is clear that the Green New Deal offers Labour a framework to translate the politics woven through The Green Transformation into a coherent policy platform advancing in tandem workers, climate and global justice.

We should also be clear that without backing from Labour, the Green New Deal stands no chance of success in the UK.

In appreciating the constraints Labour’s leadership are under when it comes to policy formation – climate in particular – we can organise from the grassroots to support them to go further. Rebecca Long-Bailey, Labour’s Shadow Secretary of State for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy, called for Labour members to exert this pressure from below in February.

Pressure from members

The radical framing of The Green Transformation makes it clear there is space to push. Members have a key role to play in building support for the transformative vision of a Green New Deal.

Together we must make the common sense argument that austerity ideology must be abandoned to win popular consent for the massive levels of public investment needed to transform the UK’s economy and revitalise green industry.

This week Labour members have started to do just that. The new Labour for a Green New Deal campaign seeks to activate Labour members, supports and trade unionists to make the case for a transformative Green New Deal to deliver the shared solutions for our crises of climate, work, poverty and inequality.

Labour has over 500,000 members. If we all come together to demand a Green New Deal, the future will surely be ours.

This Author

Chris Saltmarsh is co-founder of Labour for a Green New Deal. He is also co-director of Climate Change Campaigns at People & Planet. He tweets at @chris_saltmarsh.

Around the world people’s ability to access enough fresh water to live and live well is being threatened as sources of freshwater and the species that rely on them are devastated and depleted.

Our changing climate and the growth of global population by approximately 85 million people a-year are often cited as the main causes of the world’s water crisis. But neither climate change nor population growth alone can adequately account for our present situation.

The consumption of global water supplies is doubling every 20 years, at more than twice the rate of human population growth. Experts believe we ought to see climate change as a product and intensifier of our existing water crisis, as well as a contributing cause. Right Livelihood Award Laureate and clean water advocate, Maude Barlow, explains:

Mining and water

“Major bodies of water have been destroyed from over extraction and water diversion, not climate change as we usually describe it. The destruction of watersheds and water–retentive land is causing rapidly growing desertification, which in turn warms the planet.”

A pressing question, then, is: who is responsible for this destruction, diversion and desertification?

The mining industry is a key, but often overlooked, contributor to the global water crisis as a whole and the suffering caused by it.

Though the industry may not consume as much water in absolute amounts as, say, industrial agriculture, mining is capable of polluting water bodies over vast distances. Even when a mine has closed its impacts on water may continue to worsen and spread for centuries, leaving a toxic legacy for future generations.

On World Water Day 2019 it is critical to call out the mining industry for its crimes against water and our human right to it. Two factors make this task especially urgent.

Greenwashing mining 

First, the mining industry is actively seeking to greenwash its image by, for example, ‘mapping mining to the sustainable development goals’.

This includes Goal 6: Clean Water and Sanitation, and as we will see, the industry’s claim to anything nearing responsibility and sustainability is tenuous at best.

Second, because mining is emerging as a new and genuine threat to ‘new frontiers’ of water. In the race to extract ‘clean’, ‘green’ minerals and metals for, amongst other things, electric vehicles, mining companies want to mine the little-understood ecosystems of the deep sea.

The International Seabed Authority (ISA), a UN body, has issued 27 contracts for mineral exploration in the deep sea. These contracts encompass a combined area of more than 1.4 million km2.

Mining’s can unleash sudden and devastating impacts on water systems and communities.

Mining disasters

The recent collapse of a dam at the Corrego do Feijao Mine, Minas Gerais, Brazil, operated by Brazilian mining company Vale, has re-highlighted the deadly consequences of tailings dam disasters. The death toll has reached an estimated 186, many remain missing and hundreds have been left injured while local water sources have been devastated.

Just three years ago, also in Minas Gerais, the Vale – BHP Billiton co-owned Samarco mine also suffered a dam breach. The flood of mud and waste released killed 19 people and sent a plume of mine waste down the Doce River.

This waste turned over 500km of the Doce bright orange and, two years on, in 2017, 88.9 percent of the 18 monitoring stations along the river still found the waters of the Doce unsuitable for consumption.

When disasters like these occur, they are often painted as one-off events by the industry or the actions of a rogue company. But a recent analysis conducted by the Responsible Mining Foundation (RMI) revealed that 30 of the world’s leading mining companies scored poorly (a low average of 22 percent) when it came to preventing tailings (mine waste) risks.

Even more worryingly, 17 of these companies showed no indication of tracking, reviewing or taking action to mitigate these risks.

Despite the industry’s regular claims about advances in technology and safety, studies show that catastrophic tailings dam collapses are getting more and more common, as is the devastation to communities and waterways they cause.

Toxic footprint

Mining is also a cause of chronic pollution that can contaminate waterways for generations.

The leaking of toxic minerals or Acid Mine Drainage into groundwater systems is one common impact. In Johannesburg, for example, the water supply of a whole city is threatened by contamination caused by century-old gold mines.

The Xikrin community in Brazil, whose territory has been exploited for nickel by Mineraçao Onça Puma, owned by Vale, have reported a significant declines in the abundance of fish and other water-borne organisms since mining began.

Community members have started to manifest symptoms typical from exposure to polluted water, such as rashes and burning eyes. Although their suspicions have been disregarded by the company, they were confirmed after a 2015 study that revealed the river’s water contained a higher proportion of heavy metals than recommended by the National Environmental Council (CONAMA).The water is no longer drinkable or safe to bathe in or cook with.

The Xikrin also use the river in their rituals. These are so central to their culture that they would rather continue to bathe in a polluted river than cut ties with their ancestral customs and identity.

Digging for justice

Unable to operate safely on land, the mining industry cannot be trusted to reach into the deep sea’s fragile ecosystems for minerals and metals. Nor can companies be trusted to regulate their own activities in the name of sustainability, like extractive foxes watching the SDG hen house.

The solutions to mining’s disastrous and chronic impacts on water systems globally must be systemic in nature. As well as dramatically improved and well-enforced regulation, we need to address the fundamental drivers of ‘new’ mining- overconsumption, a one-size fits all, materialist development paradigm and an economic system that demands the extraction and commodification of ever greater quantities of minerals and metals.

Communities fighting tooth and nail to defend their sources of water, fish and spiritual well-being, know this and are increasingly calling for alternatives to ‘extractivism’. One of the best tools for holding industry to account is to ensure information flows to these communities as early in their struggles as possible and as freely as water.

Mining companies, when entering new territories, frequently mislead frontline communities by downplaying or concealing the potential risks to their lands, livelihoods and waters.

In an aim to address this, The Gaia Foundation and the global Yes to Life, No to Mining solidarity network have put together the Water is Life Toolkit.

Launched today, on World Water Day 2019, the toolkit is available in English, Spanish and French. It can be accessed online and it is designed for frontline communities and their allies. The toolkit is composed of different written, pictorial and video resources that inform communities about mining’s impacts on water and how to defend this most precious element.

More resources

Visit the toolkit here.

Read an interactive story about the toolkit and communities defending water from Colombia to Finland.

These Authors

Sara Campanales is a biologist and primatologist currently working at The Gaia Foundation. Her recent academic fieldwork has focused on the social aspects of conservation in Ecuador.  Hannibal Rhoades is Communications and Advocacy Coordinator at The Gaia Foundation, a UK-based organisation working internationally to support indigenous and local communities to revive their knowledge, livelihoods and healthy ecosystems.

Globally, for the first time ever, more than half of the world’s population lives in urban areas. The rapid growth of cities presents serious challenges, such as pressure on freshwater supplies, the living environment and public health.

Goal 11 of the 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals is to “make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable”.

The latest issue of Resurgence & Ecologist magazine is out now!

As well as the challenges, cities also present opportunities: housing and population density can bring efficiency gains for technological innovation to reduce resource and energy consumption. Cities can move faster than national governments; hence the new mantra: “While nations talk, cities act.”

Sustainable alternative

The London Waste and Recycling Board (LWARB) had this in mind when we signed up to become part of the CircE Project – an EU Interreg-funded collaboration between eight regions and cities looking at ways to overcome barriers to a circular economy.

We welcomed those European partners to our new office in London to show how the city is accelerating its transition to a circular economy.

The group visited sites such as Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, Mercato Metropolitano (a food market building a sustainable food community in Southwark), and Sustainable Bankside. LWARB also hosted an evening in which pioneering London-based small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) such as the award-winning Chip[s] Board, Toast Ale and Library of Things presented their circular business models.

I believe that it is cities that will power a global circular economy – an approach that provides a sustainable and profitable alternative to the way our ‘linear’ economy currently works. This belief sits at the heart of everything LWARB does.

In June 2017 we published London’s Circular Economy Route Map, one of the first of its kind. Prioritising action in the built environment, food, textiles, plastics and electronic equipment sectors, the Route Map identifies a £7-billion-per-year opportunity for London in these areas alone.

Since then, other cities and countries have followed suit as the advantages of a circular economy become clearer and more pressing.

Fertile ground

In London, LWARB is establishing one of the most comprehensive circular economy programmes for a city anywhere in the world. 

London is fertile ground: four of the UK’s top ten universities are here, it is a global financial centre, and it has a thriving tech sector, amongst other advantages.

The LWARB programme is built upon three main pillars: helping circular businesses to grow through advice and funding; working with corporates to develop circular economy demonstration projects; and working with local authorities to recycle more waste.

LWRB’s Advance London programme provides investment and business support to SMEs that want to grow their circular businesses or transition to a circular business model. We have invested in several circular economy funds, and our business support team, jointly funded by the EU, has so far helped over 100 SMEs and is still only halfway through a three-year programme.

We are working with some of the most innovative enterprises in the world, which use recycled material as an input, make their products recyclable, more durable or modular, and sell products as services (leasing) or enable the sharing of excess capacity.

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The Circular London programme works with corporates to demonstrate the possibilities of the circular economy through pilot projects and create a network of circular economy practitioners to help deliver the Route Map actions.

If we can demonstrate effective and profitable circular business models and the right policy context to help them flourish, we could make a difference not just in London, but globally.

The Resource London programme is London’s waste authority and business waste support programme, a partnership between LWARB and WRAP (Waste and Resources Action Programme). Its objective is primarily to increase London’s recycling rate, helping to deliver the mayor’s aim that London become a zero-waste city and ensuring that by 2030 65 percent of London’s municipal waste is being recycled.

The programme works with London’s waste authorities to improve and harmonise services, but also communicates directly with Londoners through a range of behaviour-change campaigns, in order to minimise waste and make recycling the norm.

A circular economy keeps products and materials circulating within the economy at their highest value for as long as possible, an approach that is more resource-efficient and protects businesses from fluctuating commodity prices. It could provide a more stable operating environment for manufacturers, retailers and con­sumers – potentially of benefit to London post Brexit as it also creates the possibility of new revenue streams, markets and product lines.

Dynamic collaboration 

This is LWARB’s vision for London – a circular city that capitalises on these opportunities to become a more resili­ent, resource-efficient and competitive city of the future.

Through our work with stakeholders of every variety, we aim to be the lead facilitator and practitioner of circular economy in London, already home to so many exciting circular businesses across a range of sectors.

Through collaboration with businesses, consumers, policymakers and others, we know that our progressive and outward-looking city can sustain and grow one of the most open and dynamic (circular) economies in the world.

This Author

Ali Moore is communications & behaviour change manager at Resource London. This article as first published in Resurgence & Ecologist magazine.

I have written a new book, Elegant Simplicity. My reason for writing it is that simplicity has most of the answers to most of our questions. Simplicity is the prerequisite for sustainability, spirituality and social harmony.

Let’s begin with the question of sustainability. Consumerism clutters our homes, our lives and our workplaces. Our wardrobes are full of unworn clothes: shoes, jumpers and jackets, and much more. In our kitchens, things sit in cupboards hardly used as we hold on to them thinking that one day they will be useful – but that day rarely arrives. It is the same story on our desks: papers, files and books pile up day after day and clutter the space.

The new issue of Resurgence & Ecologist is out now!

We have become habituated to accumulate and store. Look at the attic, look at the bedroom, look at the storeroom – everywhere clutter and more clutter.

Unnecessary accumulation

All this material has to be taken from somewhere, from the Earth and from Nature. Mass extraction, mass production, mass distribution and consumption result in mass waste and mass pollution. If we are serious about sustainability, then we have to change our habit of accumulating unnecessary possessions in our homes and workplaces, and learn the art of living well with less.

If 7 billion people on this planet Earth were to accumulate, consume and then waste and pollute as we Europeans and Americans do, we would need three planets and perhaps more. But we don’t have three planets – we have only one. Therefore, living simply and making a small footprint on the Earth is a sustainability imperative.

Many of the goods we accumulate are made cheaply in China or Bangladesh. They are not only cheap, but often ugly or at least not beautiful. We buy them and soon get bored with them, so we throw them away and the landfills get crammed full.

Simplicity requires elegance and beauty. Whatever we have should be beautiful, useful and durable at the same time. I call it the ‘BUD’ principle of elegant simplicity.

The Shakers set a superb example of this principle. My mother used to say: “Have few things, but have beautiful things, so that you can cherish them, use them and wear them with pleasure.” This traditional wisdom is common sense, but sadly such common sense is no longer common. Therefore, I have to write a book about it!

Spiritual fulfilment 

Simplicity is a prerequisite for spirituality. For our personal wellbeing, we need to have time for ourselves so that we can meditate, do yoga or tai chi, read poetry or books of spiritual teaching, and be at ease within ourselves.

In order to acquire gadgets and other possessions, we have to work hard to earn money, then we have to work hard to shop around and spend money, and then we have to work hard to look after the stuff we have accumulated.

Then we complain that we have no time for ourselves, for our spiritual wellbeing, for imaginative work like reading or writing poetry, for painting or gardening, for music, for walking. Cluttered homes create cluttered minds.

If we live simply, we will need less money, we will need to work less, and our time will be liberated from drudgery and boring routine. Then we can pursue the path of spiritual fulfilment, focus on personal wellbeing and on the development of arts and the imagination. Then we can have time and space for friendship and for love. It is a beautiful paradox – mat­erial minimalism maximises spiritual wellbeing.

Simplicity is also a prerequisite for social justice. If a few of us have too much, others have too little. So we need to live simply so that others may simply live.

Social inequality

Some of the clutter we accumulate is called luxuries: more than one house, more than one car, more than one computer; in other words, more of everything. Then some of us go for even greater extravagances: a private yacht, a private jet, and so on.

Such inequality represents injustice and creates envy and social discord. I have known a few people with such lux­uries and they are no happier than those who have a much simpler lifestyle.

Happiness does not lie in the possession of things: happiness lies in contentment of the heart. When we know that enough is enough, we always have enough; and when we don’t know enough is enough, however much we have, it is never enough.

When I speak of simplicity I don’t mean a life of deprivation, hair-shirt living or hardship. I believe in a good life, in beautiful things, in arts and crafts, and in sufficiency. I believe in joy and celebration.

This is why I put the word ‘elegant’ before ‘simplicity’. Simplicity is and should be elegant. We all need and should have a comfortable and pleasant life. But at the moment our complicated lives are no longer comfortable.

Discovering genius

We are sacrificing comfort for the sake of convenience, and the pursuit of convenience has led us astray. If we are blessed with wealth, we can use it for philanthropy – for caring for the Earth and her people.

Living simply requires attention, awareness and mindfulness. E.F. Schumacher said that any fool can make things complicated but it requires a genius to make things simple. And we all have that innate genius within us.

The only thing we need to do is to pay attention and discover our genius to live well and live simply.

This Author

Elegant Simplicity by Satish Kumar will be published by New Society Publishers in spring 2019. This article was first published in Resurgence & Ecologist magazine. 

Satish Kumar will give a talk on Elegant Simplicity at the October Gallery, 24 Old Gloucester St, Bloomsbury, London WC1N 3AL at 6.30pm on 23 May 2019. Tickets £10. 

 

 

Charcoal and other solid biomass fuels are still used in 70 percent of Sub-Saharan Africa, killing over 4 million people annually and depleting forests, in turn reducing rainfall and contributing to climate change and other impacts.

Fortunately, it’s not too late for Sub-Saharan Africa to avert a charcoal-induced public health and environmental catastrophe, and in the process strengthen its clean energy independence and economic growth.  

Charcoal is used mainly for cooking by the urban and peri-urban poor; firewood is used by rural populations. Urbanization – at its highest in Sub-Saharan Africa and projected to double there in the next 25 years– overwhelmingly drives charcoal’s rising demand in Sub-Saharan Africa. Sub-Saharan Africa’s population is skyrocketing at an annual average of 2.55 percent from 2010 to 2015 with more than half of global population growth expected in Sub-Saharan Africa by 2050.

Environmental impacts

Global firewood use is expected to plateau over the next 20 years while charcoal will continue to rise, mostly in Sub-Saharan Africa. 

The use of charcoal and other biomass is estimated to kill 4.3 million annually– mainly women and children exposed to smoke from cooking charcoal indoors, causing acute respiratory illnesses, cataracts, heart disease and cancer. 

Added to this, Charcoal production severely impacts tropical forest ecosystem services (e.g., shade, soil and water retention, water regulation, carbon sequestration, wildlife habitat) and reduces overall ecosystem resilience.

Over-harvesting of select species for charcoal depletes plant diversity and subsequently diminishes faunal abundance and biodiversity dependent on forest ecosystems.

GHG emissions from producing charcoal in tropical ecosystems are estimated at 103.7 M tons of CO2equivalent (roughly a quarter of total tropical deforestation emissions) and significantly more when counting emissions from use. Charcoal is a top driver of tropical forest loss in the last two decades– with the greatest footprint in Africa.

Energy sources

Firewood and charcoal will remain top energy sources in Sub-Saharan Africa without a swift transition to cleaner, renewable energy.

With Sub-Saharan Africa expected to increase demand for biomass fuels by 40 percent by 2040 under business-as-usual, it is hard to imagine how the world will achieve a switch to 70-85 percent renewables by 2040 as recommended by the International Panel on Climate Change.

Yet without alternative energy sources, simple solutions such as charcoal bans enacted in Malawi, Kenya, and Chad have forced poor households dependent on charcoal to burn furniture, cow dung and even their own homes for energy.

Besides being the only energy source available in much of Sub-Saharan Africa, charcoal is a key income source in rural areasand rivals major economic sectors in many Sub-Saharan Africa countries. 

For countries like Uganda to start resembling Wakanda, they will need to find ways to both dramatically ramp up renewable energies and make existing charcoal value chains more sustainable. 

Improving business-as-usual

Traditional charcoal production methods used in Sub-Saharan Africa typically yield 15-20 percent or less in dry weight and take eight days to produce in industrial kilns. 

Improved methods can achieve 40-60 percent yields and only take 15 minutes to two hours to produce, potentially helping reduce deforestation and GHG emissions. 

Improved cookstoves (ICS) can vastly improve per-unit efficiency over conventional stoves by improved designs and materials.

But ICS have had limited adoption in Sub-Saharan Africa, despite decades of promotional campaigns and distribution – roughly 53 million stoves and fuels between 2010 and 2015.

Research suggests barriers to long-term adoption of new technologies to tackle relate to cultural behaviors, income and literacy levels. 

Solar power

With 90 percent of Sub-Saharan Africa’s total estimated power capacity, solar has abundant potential to provide Sub-Saharan Africa with clean, renewable energy.

Moreover, the lifetime cost of a solar cooking system is comparable to that of charcoal and liquefied petroleum gas (LPG), and dropping rapidly with technology improvements.

As the majority of PV upfront costs are invested in batteries, users need financing schemes such as pay-as-you-go meters charging daily rates comparable to charcoal costs. 

Solar water heating provides a cheap and technologically-simple alternative to charcoal. Switching from charcoal-heated water to solar-heated water for bathing is one of the simplest and most cost-effective renewable energy technologies.

Equally importantly, residential solar water heaters can be constructed and installed cheaply using local materials.

Electricity and gas

Direct electricity access via a grid significantly reduces costs for electric cookers, as users don’t have to pay for batteries (assuming reliable access). Zambian residents have been found to prefer e-cookers as they cook quicker, produce less fumes and can be left alone to cook.

Though access to electricity has risen 160 percent across Sub-Saharan Africa from 1990 to 2016, many countries will require significant grid expansion for electricity access to become the norm.

Or there’s gas. A mixture of propane and butane, LPG is versatile, portable, often less expensive per month than charcoal, and produces less pollution than kerosene, charcoal or wood.

LPG is increasingly seen as a viable, modern fuel to replace charcoal. When given the choice, women often choose LPG over charcoal or other biomass. 

As the African LPG market is small and sparse, increasing LPG adoption would require awareness campaigns, safety regulations and enforcement, and public subsidies to support the initial switch. 

Green pioneers

Moving on from charcoal in Sub-Saharan Africa will require innovative energy sources and means of delivery.

For example, Rwandan entrepreneurs are marketing organic waste-based briquettes and wood pellet-fired cookstoves to replace charcoal. 

In Kenya and Tanzania, pay-as-you-go fuel companies install an LPG stove, cylinder, and meter, and then accept mobile payments enabling consumers to purchase as little as a day’s worth of LPG, for $0.50, at a time, with automatic delivery of new gas when fuel levels run low.

Improved equipment

An essential first step towards improving existing charcoal value chains is to revise market regulations to define sustainable sources and methods for charcoal production.

For example, since 2002 Ghana’s Energy Commission has instituted guidelines on sustainable charcoal production, whereby only approved sources (sawmill residues or plantations established for charcoal production) may export charcoal.

Additionally, programs will need to train traditional charcoal producers to employ efficient methods, develop awareness and disseminate efficient cookstoves, such as under Ghana’s Sustainable Energy Action Plan.

Given the weak adoption of improved cookstoves to date, user-centered design is essential to map types of charcoal users and pinpoint where and what kinds of interventions are most needed.

Despite rapidly falling costs and swiftly increasing installed capacity for charcoal alternatives such as solar PV in Sub-Saharan Africa, government policies are critical to promote these alternatives to their full potential.

Government support

At a minimum, governments looking to raise revenues through import taxes should avoid taxing imports of materials and parts needed for solar or LPG, which would undercut the price advantage of these energy systems over charcoal. 

More proactively, governments can help by disseminatinginformation and security to buyers of alternative energy systems. This can include testing equipment to make sure it meets standards (like the Energy Star efficiency certification program in the U.S.) and awareness campaigns to inform buyers what to look for in systems and how to use them.

To help users avoid upfront costs for charcoal alternatives, governments can also support development of mobile money financing schemes, or at a minimum, explicitly make them legal. 

Identification and mapping of charcoal users will facilitate adoption of alternatives to power clean cookstoves either via grid or off-grid electricity access. 

Raising awareness

Charcoal-use reduction awareness and behavior change communications focused in urban areas, food vendors, and catering facilities have been found successful in encouraging adoption of charcoal alternatives. 

Such programs need to assess potential economic and social barriers to large-scale market diffusion, such as payback times, technical complexity and public awareness and trust in the technology. To avoid forming cultural barriers of charcoal alternatives as being seen as inferior, programs should avoid only targeting such energy systems to poorer classes.

Though currently the charcoal business-as-usual outlook isn’t pretty for Sub-Saharan Africa, hope is not lost.

Solar power and other charcoal alternatives can help reduce deforestation, damage to women’s health, and mitigate climate change, with support from governments, civil society and private sector entrepreneurs via the methods outlined above.

This Author 

John Costenbader is a climate change and natural resource governance specialist with DAI who advises governments, civil society and the private sector on environmental law, policy and program issues.

 

Britain and Italy are squaring off to host the UN’s 2020 climate change summit – a key moment where countries will be expected to ramp up their commitments under the Paris Agreement. 

However, both countries face significant domestic uncertainties that year, with the strong possibility of early general elections and economic and political problems.

In the UK, it’s not yet clear if the country will have left the European Union by then, be in the middle of a transition or even still locked in negotiations over leaving the bloc.

Government priorities

In Italy, current public opinion polls predict a full-out win for the right-wing League party, which now shares power with the populist 5 Star Movement.

Luca Bergamaschi, an energy and climate change expert at the think-tanks E3G and Italian Institute for International Affairs, said: “New elections before the Cop26 are important because they can change a government’s priorities. Having a Cop26 potentially guided by the League raises strong doubts about whether Italy could guide a meeting which is very, very important.”

While the UK government may still be consumed by Brexit or its fallout, Jennifer Tollmann, a policy advisor also at E3G, says that Britain has “the diplomatic network to pull off the significant outreach that will be required of the Cop26 presidency. It has consistently driven the climate agenda within Europe and there are numerous cities that could host it.”

The government has also made an effort to show leadership in recent years. It partnered with Canada in 2017 to form an anti-coal alliance, started the process of strengthening its 2050 climate goals last year, and is now co-chairing talks on climate resilience for a special UN summit in September.

The annual Cop summits rotate between five regional groups. Britain and Italy sit with other Western European countries, the US, Australia, Canada, Iceland, New Zealand, Norway and Switzerland.

Diplomatic muscle

Both countries confirmed their bids during the Cop24 summit in Poland in December. The UK also wrote a letter to the regional group in February.

The group is now under pressure to choose a host at a June UN meeting in Bonn, ahead of the secretary-general’s September summit.

That New York meeting is meant to begin pushing countries to strengthen their commitments for tackling climate change up to 2030 and come out with plans for 2050, as the Paris Agreement calls on them to do by 2020. Cop26 will be the final stage for those changes – requiring heavy diplomatic muscle from its presidency.

UK energy and clean growth minister Claire Perry said in a statement to the UN’s climate change secretariat in January that: “Cop26 in 2020 will be a pivotal moment to encourage and take stock of global ambition and prepare the ground for further action. 

“It is for that reason that the UK expressed interest in hosting Cop26, continuing to show our global leadership in climate action. However, we note the interest of other countries and will engage with them on this matter.”

Regional disagreement

Italy first floated the idea of hosting under the previous Democratic Party-led government early last year.

The country’s environment ministry is now run by the 5 Star Movement, which tends to advocate for stronger environmental and climate change measures.

The League has largely stayed out of environmental policy since the coalition government took over a year ago, except in supporting a controversial gas pipeline and other infrastructure projects. However, its European Parliament members – including now-party leader and interior minister Matteo Salvini – voted against ratifying the Paris accord in 2016.

A fight is also brewing over where the summit would be held in Italy.

The northern region of Lombardy, which includes Milan, wrote a letter to the government asking to be considered, even though environment minister Sergio Costa has mentioned his home city of Naples, the newspaper Il Denaro reported in February. Milan hosted the Cop9 in 2003, and was the Democratic Party’s preferred location.

The regional group is expected to decide on the winner later this year, either at talks in Bonn or at the Cop25 summit in Chile.

This Author

Sara Stefanini is Climate Home News’ senior reporter, covering Brexit and broader stories. She is also a freelance writer, contributing to the Financial Times and other organisations. This Article first appeared on Climate Home.  
 

Rosie Inman-Cook, manager of The Natural Death Centre (NDC), reflects: “When I first started out with this and people asked what I did in a social situation, I really struggled with it, because I wanted to just say that I buried people in shallow graves in the woods.”

At that time very few people were aware of green or natural burial, or that it was feasible and legal. But that was nearly twenty years ago, when there were just 50 natural burial sites.

The latest issue of Resurgence & Ecologist magazine is out now!

Today, says Inman-Cook, there are well over 300.

Natural burial

There are effectively two types of natural burial ground in the UK, according to the NDC, which runs the Association of Natural Burial Grounds to ensure that sites are well run.

There are ‘deep green’ sites, where embalming is not allowed and bodies are placed in caskets made of biodegradable material such as wicker, or wrapped in a simple shroud.

At the other end of the spectrum there are sites where a tree is planted but no other environmentally friendly rules apply. Settings can range from mown wild-flower meadows to woodland, field sites where new woodland is being established, or more manicured parkland.

The sites are run by landowners such as farmers, charitable trusts and non-profit organisations, and many local authorities are now setting aside parts of municipal cemeteries for this type of burial.

However, Inman-Cook warns that some large companies have spotted the trend and set up burial grounds that are much more commercialised, so people should go and visit before booking.

Traditional burials

Natural burials have several benefits for the environment over cremation or traditional burial in a cemetery, according to proponents of nat­ural burial.

Cremation uses fossil fuels to reduce a body to ash, and this is estimated to release more than 270,000 tonnes of CO2 annually in the US alone. It also releases particulates such as nitrogen oxide, and mercury from dental fillings, though some countries require crematoria to have filters to reduce these emissions. Formaldehyde used in embalming can also cause pollution.

Traditional burial also has a large footprint. The Green Burial Council, which certifies sites in the US, estimates that each year North Americans use 6 million metres of wood, 20 million litres of embalming fluids, 1.5 million tonnes of reinforced concrete, 15,000 tonnes of copper and bronze, and 58,500 tonnes of steel in traditional burials.

The natural burial movement has now spread around the world. In Europe, many countries have laws that currently prevent natural burial, but the Netherlands does not, and has seen a growth in the practice.

Joyce Sengers is the founder of De Utrecht Natural Burial Ground, one of around 15 such sites in the Netherlands. She cites various reasons for a trend towards natural burial, including the fall in churchgoing, meaning that there are many people looking for alternative ways to bury the dead. At the same time, the number of natural burial grounds is increasing as landowners look for other sources of income, she says.

Grave maintenance 

The De Utrecht site is located on a former conifer plantation, and since it was set up around five years ago it has been transformed into a Nature reserve featuring moorland, wetlands, a shady wood, a light wood and a birch forest. Ceremonies can be held by a lake or on the edge of the birch forest.

Sengers said: “People like it, especially because it’s so simple and they don’t have to do grave maintenance. It’s also a nice place to visit – you don’t go to visit a two-square-metre plot where the body is: you go to the whole woodland, where you can go for a walk.”

Natural burial has also become popular in the US. Sites certified by the Green Burial Council have grown from one in 2006 to more than 300 today.

However, a not-for-profit organisation in Washington State is hoping to take the concept a step further with a completely new method of disposing of human remains. The concept was developed by architecture graduate Katrina Spade when she started thinking about what would happen to her body after she died, and was disappointed with the traditional options of burial and cremation, in terms of both the environmental impact and the lack of involvement of friends and family.

Spade was inspired by a method that has long been used to speed up the natural decomposition of deceased farm animals. Her organisation has developed a process known as recomposition, using the same principle to dispose of human remains. It is modelled on green burial, but is designed for cities where land is scarce.

Natural recomposition 

In this process, the body would be placed in a vessel containing woodchips, alfalfa and straw, to which oxygen would be added to create the perfect environment for naturally occurring microbes and beneficial bacteria, Spade explains.

After about 30 days, the body, including bones and teeth, would have broken down to create a nutrient-rich soil. The family could then use the soil to grow plants or trees, or it could be donated to conservation projects in nearby Puget Sound.

The ritual around death, which is “an incredible moment that we all share”, has been diluted by the traditional funeral industry, Spade believes. “Cremation is often very industrialised – it’s kind of a transactional practice. When you strip ritual from this really important event, it bolsters our denial of death. We push it to arm’s length.”

At a facility run by Spade’s organisation Recompose, family and friends of the deceased could not only view the body, but also wash, shroud and prepare it for burial.

A bill to legalise recomposition is due to be considered by Washington State legislators this year.

Innovative ideas

Spade is optimistic that it will pass, since residents in the state tend to be environmentally conscious and open to innovative ideas. In addition, there is awareness among politicians that a growing population needs more options, as burial space is limited.

Recompose is keen to help other areas follow suit, both in the US and worldwide, once the concept is up and running in Washington. The organisation has had enquiries from countries including Brazil, Mexico and Australia.

“Death is part of a beautiful natural cycle,” says Spade. “In a forest, organic material grows and then decomposes, and becomes the basis for all new life. That cycle is quite perfect – how practical and how beautiful to be able to create soil out of the dead.”

This Author 

Catherine Early is chief reporter for the Ecologist. This article was first published in Resurgence & Ecologist magazine. 

Image: Capsula Mundi, Francesco D’Angelo. 

Michael Gove certainly talks a good game. In the Environment Secretary’s speech to the 2019 Oxford Farming Conference he espoused views that would sit favourably in any green forum: “Beef or soybeans produced to scale on land in other countries that have been cleared of vast hectares of forests may appear cheap but in fact such food is costing the earth.”

The government has announced a seven-year transition period for agriculture, beyond the 21-month transition period set out in the EU Withdrawal Agreement, to enable farmers to plan ahead. And with an ordered departure you would surely expect to see a stop to the inefficient area-based payments which reward the rich and hold back small-scale farming initiatives.

So with the best of a bad lot as Environment Secretary, and two thirds of EU regulatory environmental protections already enshrined in UK law, is farming really in danger from Brexit – deal or no deal?

Regulatory ‘lite’

If you look closer at the much vaunted Green Brexit, Gove’s realpolitik dictates non-legally binding measures which override policy promises and easy soundbites.

The draft Environment Bill, announced by Theresa May last July and to be published in full this September, is regulatory ‘lite’: the proposed Office for Environmental Protection (OEP) will be hamstrung by having the government deciding its budget and appointing its officials.

What could have been a truly independent body with members elected or chosen without government interference and a budget set to its own strictures is now far from that.

On top of that lack of independence comes a lack of proper authority, so that post-Brexit, the policing of environmental protections – currently undertaken by the European Commission – will be passed to a body with an inability to even levy fines.

Take air pollution – in 2017 the UK faced daily five-figure fines from the European Commission for flouting EU limits for nitrogen dioxide (NO2) levels. Who would hold the government fully to account to the same extent post-Brexit?

Environmental law

Tom Fyans, Director of Campaigns and Policy at the Campaign to Protect Rural England, told The Ecologist: “We are seriously concerned that the proposed Office of Environmental Protection (OEP) will lack the true independence required to hold the government to account.

“While it has some useful legal powers, there are significant unanswered questions regarding its relationship with the planning system, when decisions are in breach of environmental law, and how it will engage with climate change – the greatest threat to the countryside. “

He added that future environmental priorities like targets for improvements to air and water quality required “much more work”.

Lexiters might see the loss of the EU Commission’s mandate over the UK in this area as no bad thing, pointing for example to the collapse of the Greek environmental regulatory system following EU banking institutions’ ‘attack’ on Greece post-2009. 

Some environmentalists are sceptical of the EU’s claims to be the environment’s best champion, and claim that it caused among other things: attacks on and privatisations of Greek national parks; mass sell-offs of public land; a rush of predatory development, particularly on islands and coasts, leading to ecological as well as social ruination.

New technologies 

Dave Bangs, author of three books on the South Downs and Surrey Weald and a leading naturalist and botanist put it this way: “Most of the wildlife professionals are focused on the enviro-regulatory measures … which are sticking plasters on an abscess. I voted Brexit because the EU is a cabal of corporations and their political infrastructure. 

“It has nothing to do with democracy and nothing to do with internationalism. Look at Schengen, look at the Mediterranean mass drownings. I’ve been an internationalist all my life … for a socialist united states of Europe, not a gang of robber barons.”

In terms of food production he asks what could be worse than the Common Agricultural and Fisheries policies, “denuding our seas and exacerbating ‘abandonment’ and hyper-intensification of farmed land”.

In the wider world there is a tendency to techno-fixes that Gove is fully signed up to. So use of artificial intelligence, sophisticated analysis of big data, drone development, machine learning and robotics and most controversially, gene editing (GM crops) – all are supported by the Environment minister as “a way to escape from the bureaucratic straitjacket of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) and develop a more vibrant farming sector with access to technologies”.

Using these techniques will form the next phase in farming – “a revolution”, no less, which the “EU is turning its back on” and will – he argues –  “allow us to dramatically improve productivity on traditionally farmed land not least by reducing the need for labour, minimising the imprint of vehicles on the soil, applying inputs overall more precisely, adjusting cultivation techniques more sensitively and therefore using far fewer natural resources, whether carbon, nitrogen or water, in order to maximise growth”.

If you were to try to sell  this to small-scale organic farmers in the UK or subsistence farmers in China and India they all point to methods passed down from generation to generation looking to work in concert with nature rather than seeking to squeeze the last drop out of her while putting in the bare minimum. 

Agro-industrialisation

On the flip side Gove’s latest pronouncements include coded warnings to climate change deniers of the Trump and Bolsonaro ilk: the earlier stated reference to forest clearance costing the earth and then this concerning US agro-industrialisation: “We must maintain our own high environmental and animal welfare standards, and we must not barter them away in pursuit of a necessarily short-term trade-off”.

The UK would be forced (under WTO rules) to make unsatisfactory deals with countries like Australia and the US if it loses a significant tranche of EU market share due to the import and export tariffs. This would entail less stringent animal welfare regulations. 

Consider the potential imports of chlorinated chicken from the US, a practice currently banned in the UK over concerns that by washing carcasses with chlorine you fail to kill all salmonella and because this process acts as an incentive for poorer hygiene standards in animal rearing. 

Bacteria are more prevalent in US flocks due to extreme intensification methods which have seen 15,500 mega farms or Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs) established coast to coast.  

Just one of these huge operations is capable of housing up to 1.7m birds crammed into inhumane cages and aircraft hangar-like sheds. In the UK there are currently just shy of 800 of these. The question being asked by animal welfare groups is, do we really want closer economic ties like these?

Free movement

In terms of UK farming itself, post-Brexit, Gove touts Environmental Land Management (ELM) contracts which are payment by results-based initiatives like planting and managing species rich meadows.

These ELMs ARE being piloted over the next two years in Norfolk, Suffolk and Yorkshire, AND  will provide farmers “with a pipeline of income to supplement the money they make from food production, forestry and other business activities”.

They are the government’s answer to the Common Agricultural Policy’s (CAP) agri-environment schemes which, according to Gove, have been “overly bureaucratic and inflexible and have impeded innovation for farmers who are passionate about the environment and want to see real change”. 

However, the overall success of ELM contracts will be blighted once EU farming subsidies are gone and the EU farm workers’ free movement stymied. Farmland is set to become the worst-hit sector in the entire UK residential and commercial property sector, according to property experts Savills, falling by 3.6 percent per year on year.

So some in the farming industry are asking how many of us will have the luxury of set asides when the economic reality will be hitting home?

Maximising growth 

Gove’s ‘maximising growth’ mantra will will surely be jettison a more accommodating farming approach based on the sound ecological principles of agro forestry; soil health; water quality and pollinator habitat improvement; support of the organic movement; landscape restoration and biodiversity enrichment; and improvements in public access to the countryside. 

In its place UK farming faces less biodiversity and more monoculture spurred on by technical advances which dispense with the husbandry of 60 years ago, reliant upon deep ecological ties with the land as well as an intuitive grasp of the seasons and the integral part played by insects, birds and wildlife.

The driver to all this, financing the farming sector, has led Gove to promise the same spend on farm support after leaving the EU up to the end of this parliament, granting a “greater degree of security over future funding for farming than that enjoyed by any other existing eu nation”.

But even if he delivers on this promise – and let’s not forget how his former boss David Cameron promised the ‘greenest government ever’ – will the continued payments really deliver sufficient environmental, as opposed to agri-business, benefits?

And how long will Gove last anyway in these politically unstable times where days of a here today, gone tomorrow politician will surely be just round the corner. How long before normal service is resumed and he’s replaced by a more compliant, agro-industrialist in the Owen Patterson mould?

No deal

Which leads us back to the question, will the UK be worse off agriculturally and environmentally when it comes to Brexit? All the signs seem to point to yes, whether we have a no deal or an ordered Brexit.

In the event of no-deal we would face a loss of trade and concomitant closer alliances with countries like Australia and the US with their poorly regulated food and farming industries.

And in the event of a ‘deal’, and the ordered roll out of the Office of Environmental Protection, this body would in fact have less authority and independence than the European Commission. 

Staying in through a successful Remain vote in a second referendum may well be the best bet for the environment, if it came to pass.

This Author

Jan Goodey is a freelance writer on environmental matters working mainly for The Ecologist.