Green Labelling

I have been surfing the blogging world recently to gauge opinion on green and ethical product labelling, and it occurs to me the that there is a fundamental flaw in the approach that is being taken by those who are posting opinions. The number of different labels used and the differences in information provided are, rather than making shopping for ethical goods easier, just increasing the confusion for the mainstream shopper.
What about a completely new approach to this subject, by turning labelling on its head. Imagine shopping if everything that is proven and audited to be ethical, eco and fair was allowed to be sold free of labels. Everything else was forced, by law, to be labelled with who, what, where, when and how it was made, shipped and sold.
The consumer would then be presented with a real, informed choice. Companies that just exploit people and the planets resources to make a big profit would be forced at point of sale to display their lack of ethical credentials. Would you buy a cheap dress at primark if it had a label on it stating the wages and living conditions of the poor kid in the third world who made it? Would you buy that nice new top if a large label on the sleeve listed the chemicals used and toxic waste produced in its manufacture and journey to the shop?
It can be an expensive business having to label everything to prove your ethical credentials on the products you sell, why do we think it’s reasonable to let the good guys bear that cost? To change the industry we need to penalise the bad guys, using the same marketing tricks used by them, to hit them where it really hurts. If Tesco were forced to say that “Every little helps us to destroy the lives and habitat of the people who supply us”, instead of getting away with just “every little helps”, it would have a monumental impact on the people who buy from them. Ethical would then very quickly become business as usual.
It is a well known con to describe industry as being consumer led, it is not. It is led by people whose only objective is to make a big profit at the expense of someone else, and to use well known marketing and advertising techniques to disguise the truth. As a society we must take the lead and lobby our politicians to produce legislation that protects the good guy’s for a change, and put the onus and the cost on those who seek to make those obscene profits and expect us to pay for it.
PS. Find the good guys on green-uk.co.uk including:- Adili, Howies, Beaumont Organics, Patagonia, untouched world, and many many more.

Green is not a party

I have great faith in human nature, in peoples goodness. I believe that most of us now realise the importance of moving to a world that trades ethically, and that we all try in some ways to be eco friendly. Recycling, conserving energy, buying organic, these things have all made the headlines over the last few years and are starting to have an impact. Green issues have made their way into mainstream education. Even the politicians have realised that this is not just a minority view, but the general view of mainstream voters. Who would have thought that we would have “Green Tories”? Ok, you might say that they are just jumping on the bandwagon to get votes, maybe they are, but every little movement in the green direction takes us just that little bit closer to where we need to be.

Green is NOT a party, but a fundamental value for all parties.

The Green Choices

You have a choice, ethically sound, or criminal.

Don’t ever forget that the working conditions for people in the mainly third world countries that supply the mainstream markets would be illegal if it were in our country. We have the luxury of health and safety, minimum wage, and all the other responsibilities that an employer has for their employees. Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for cheaper prices for clothes, and any consumer goods for that matter. But do I really want to contribute to the misery and desperation of the people who make these things? Do I really want to contribute to the profits of the criminals that exploit child labour and treat people like shit? Do you?

Danny Smith

The new eco browser

Greetings

I recently installed the new eco browser " Flock", I use Mozilla FF and ocassionally IE7. I really like the home page set up with every conceivable piece of green, environmental and eco news and blogs.

Flock is called the "Social browser" and includes feed and videos from a huge range of green sectors including environmental news, eco gossip, biofuels, green cuisine, climate news, alternative energy, solar, green business and green radio interviews.

Flock is built on the Mozilla platform so does have all the extra goodies.

Download Flock here


FB

The Eco Button

Heres a little summit to help reduce your co2 emissions and save the planet. It really is happening, its not a joke and forget listening to those people with their heads way up their asses who say "its a natural occurence" - absolutely codswallop.

Anyway back to the eco button...One push of the button activates some special software, which then powers down as much of your PC as possible (without turning it off completely), drastically cutting the power consumption - it’s claimed that it can reduce the power draw to a tiny 1.8 Watts! It costs just £14.95 and what with the way electricity prices are rising will save you money as well!

Will the Olympics help the Chinese people?

Obviously the problems for the Chinese people are greater than the smog over Bejing. However it seems to me that the response from the chinese government to the "smog issue" is symptomatic of the problems with the way the hierarchy cares for their people. Sure, they will take half the cars off the street, shut down some factories and more, reduce the pollutants for the spoilt western athletes BUT what happens when the olympic games has gone. I think we all know the answer, poor sods.