Tongai Magocha
“IF humankind continues to pollute the environment and exploit the world’s natural resources at the present rate we will have to colonise two planets in outer space within the next 50 years to survive,” a friend remarked the other day when we were discussing the environment.
Another of our friends laughed lightly and gave a teasing response: “Oh don’t be such a ‘tree-hugger’…you sound like one of those ‘greening guys’!”.
Well, the conversation or debate continued, digressing into other issues but what probably caught the attention of eavesdroppers was the phase “greening guys”.
Although some might have heard about greening quite often, it’s safe to say there are others who have little or no understanding of what really greening is all about and why “go green” in the first place.
So let’s take a closer look at the rationale of greening and what it entails.
Greening is a new way of thinking about the earth we live in, and a way of living our lives. It is a term that has become a buzzword the world over.
People decide to “go green” because they know that we only have one planet to live on, and we won’t be able to live on it much longer if we keep misusing energy and resources, and trashing our home through polluting air, land, and water.
Greening means recognising that the choices we make do not only affect us but everybody everywhere.
It is understanding that the decisions we make today not only affect the now but the future as well.
Greening means appreciating that when we talk about “caring for our planet” or “protecting the environment” we are actually referring to saving our lives and that of future generations.
We all need safe and healthy places to live and food to eat; clean water to drink and air to breath; and energy to power our homes, schools/colleges, play areas and work places.
Globalisation has made the world smaller, becoming increasingly easy to see how the lives of people and ecosystems everywhere are closely linked up with one another.
As such products made in China can affect the quality of life in Africa, pesticides used in Argentina can affect the health of people in the USA, and greenhouse gas emissions from Australia can affect a diminishing rainforest in Brazil.
The truth is every single little thing (good or bad) we do affects our planet. We all need to take stock of the health of the only planet on which life is known to exist and decide how together we can take better care of it.
One might think “Well, I’m just one individual in a planet of billions of people. I don’t think I can make a significant difference”. However, someone likened initiatives to greening to a crowd in a stadium doing the “the wave”.
It always starts with one or two people, jumping up and down like crazy and in no time the whole stadium is joining in. So it is with going green.
It starts with simple actions that can soon build into a wave that will transform the whole planet and lead us all to healthier, happier lives.
Each one of us has the power to control most of our choices – from where we live, work, what we eat to how we buy or shop – all of these have a global impact.
By greening and embracing a greener lifestyle we not only protect our environment, but it can also mean improving our health, padding our bank account and ultimately improve our quality of life.
It can mean preservation and conservation of threatened species that are endemic to our continent and so much more.
So how do we go about greening our world?
Everything – our clothes, furniture, all we have – comes from somewhere and it has an environmental impact. These do not simply come from “the shop”.
In order to help mitigate the impact of our material life we can choose goods made from green (or greener) materials, such as sustainably harvested wood, organic cotton, or repurposed and recycled materials.
Our choices will help protect forests, habitat, clean water and biodiversity; ensure sustainable land-use practices; and reduce the amount of waste clogging up our landfills.
Buying less stuff and second-hand stuff helps achieve this goal, too. Finding ways to reduce, reuse, recycle or compost the amount material we buy or use is also crucial. This reduces natural resource use and helps diverts traffic to landfills
The electricity we use also comes from somewhere. In Zimbabwe some of our electricity comes from coal-burning power plants which also happen to be one of the major contributors of air pollution in our nation.
By use of clean sources of energy such as solar (even in small ways such as using solar powered geysers and other electrical appliances) we can help reduce demand for energy from more polluting sources.
Our choice of transport means less global warming. Anytime we choose to walk, ride a bicycle or take public transport we reduce the carbon emissions and other air pollutants created by driving fuel or diesel powered vehicles.
This can help reduce the impact of global warming and climate change. Clean water is perhaps the planet’s most precious resource, and, with the increasing effects of global climate change, for many regions across the globe, our ability to have enough high-quality water on hand could likely to change in the near future.
Being water conscious and conservation orientated helps reduce strain on municipal treatment systems and ensures there’s enough to go around.
Making clothing involves a large amount of materials, energy and labor including the pesticides used to grow crops for textiles, the dyes and water used to color them, and conditions under which laborers work.
By choosing eco-friendly clothing – say, purchasing organic over conventional cotton, one of the world’s most chemically dependent crops, you also choose a better product that is easier on the soil and groundwater.
Greening can also be applied in the workplace. Computers can be set to energy-saving settings and make sure to shut them down when you leave for the day (“standby” settings will continue to draw power even when not in use).
Printers, scanners, and other peripherals that are only used occasionally can be unplugged until they’re needed.
And of course, turn off lights in spaces that are unoccupied.
The greenest paper is no paper at all, so we can keep things digital and dematerialised whenever possible.
The more we do online, the less we need paper; keeping files on computers instead of in file cabinets; reviewing documents onscreen rather than printing them out and sending emails instead of paper letters.
Some paper use can’t be avoided, so we can use recycled paper and envelopes that have been processed and colored using eco-friendly methods.
I am sure we can go on and on. There are just a lot of greening initiatives that we can become tired and get into what one might call “green fatigue”.
But we can never get tired of caring for our planet and doing that is no cakewalk.
We have to keep on keeping on so that we may indeed make an even better world for tomorrow.
Tongai Magocha is Business Council for Sustainable Development – Bulawayo Branch Secretary and BUMIRA Technical Projects Administrator. He can be contacted on cellphone: +263 771 532 271 or email: [email protected]