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Monthly archives: May 2010

Submitting ourselves to a chemical world

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Submission-sign
Photo from the film “Submission”.

After the Second World War humans used 1 million tonnes of chemicals per year. Now we use around 500 million tonnes. What does this mean? The documentary “Submission” tries to find it out.

In the early 1980:s the Swedish film maker Stefan Jarl made a documentary called “Naturens hämnd” (Nature’s revenge), which is about human’s manipulation of nature and how nature sometimes strikes back.

Thirty years later he comes back to the same theme, but from a different angle. The film, called “Submission” is about what he calls “the chemical society”, a world where thousands of chemicals are used in everyday life – as plastic softeners in toys, flame retardants in furniture or ingredients in cosmetics. Every day we are exposed to these chemicals, and the truth is that we know very little about what they do to our bodies or to nature.

Submission-Eva-Röse

The actress Eva Röse testes her blood in the film "Submission". Photo from the film.

In 2003 the EU Environment Commissioner Margot Wallstrom got her blood tested for human-made chemicals to illustrate the urgency of the EU’s radical review of its chemicals policy. Now Stefan Jarl, and his 35 year younger friend, the actress Eva Röse, do the same thing to see what chemicals their bodies are storing.

“Submission” also contains interviews with 23 international scientists to give a broader image of what this all means. One of them calls the way we handle man-made chemicals a “scary experiment”. And even if this is far from an action film it is quite a shaking documentary.

Stefan Jarl writes in his presentation of the film (available in English): “Like most of my other documentaries, Submission is, at the core, about what kind of society we want to live in. It is the most important film I’ve ever made. Ever.”

Sara Jeswani - Sustainability

May 31, 2010

How to save an onion

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onion-in-a-pot

A sad onion got a new life as a spring onion in my kitchen window.

I have already written a few times about how much food we throw away without even thinking about it. Swedes are estimated to throw away 900 000 tonnes (!) of fully edible food every year. Producing that food causes CO2 emissions equal to those from about 700 000 medium-sized cars used during one year.

A book called “100 sätt att rädda maten” (100 ways to save the food) has given me a lot of ideas about how to avoid throwing what could be used. The author Annica Triberg gives advice about trusting to our senses instead of blindly obeying the best-before date printed on the pack. Leftovers that aren’t enough to make a whole meal can be masked as interesting starters, served in small shot glasses.

According to Annica Triberg, shopping on large scale isn’t as wise as it might sound. It’s easy to get tempted by a special offer, but what is actually the use of two kilos of potato salad, if you don’t fancy eating potato salad every day for one week? Many of our “smart” purchases risk ending up in the bin.

One of the ideas I like the most is to place onions that have become too soft on top of a layer of earth in a pot and water slightly. After a few days you have tasty spring onion which can be cut with a pair of scissors and used in the food.

I can’t think of more locally grown vegetables than that!

Sara Jeswani - Sustainability

May 27, 2010

The value of biodiversity

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meadow
Photo: Britt-Marie  Sohlström/Flickr.

Saturday was the international day of biodiversity. Although I didn’t participate in any of the activities to make people aware of this, the enormous diversity in nature is difficult to ignore for anyone who walks through Stockholm right now.

Flowers are painting the whole city in different colours, birds are flying around and if you stand under a maple-tree you’ll hear the humming song from thousands of insects.

Yet we have lost many species, both animals and plants. Scientists have estimated that there were once about 10 000 different types of edible plants in the world. Today only 150 of them feeds most of the globe’s population, and 12 plant species (such as rice, wheat and corn) provide 80 percent of the nutrition we get from the vegetable kingdom.

In Sweden about 3 500 different mammal species are considered to be threatened or disadvantaged.

There has been several studies trying to show the huge economic value that biodiversity brings. And of course many of our economic activities simply wouldn’t be possible if it wasn’t for bees pollinating our fruit trees and vegetable plants or small organisms cleaning the water, for example. But I’m not sure that putting a price on plants and species is the best way to protect nature. If we couldn’t make money on these services, wouldn’t they be worth saving? And what about those parts of the ecosystems that we actually cannot make an economic worth of?

Another explanation to why biodiversity is important, coming from environmental organisations and scientists, would be this: If biodiversity is weakened – if species die out or we suddenly only have one kind of say apple trees – the whole ecosystem becomes so much more vulnerable. This big web of interdependent smaller systems is almost unforseeable. If one species disappears, nothing might happen, but on the other hand we can also face a long chain of other species following in its footsteps. We simply don’t know beforehand.

Or, yet another reason to care about biodiversity: Do we humans, as a species, have the right to eradicate other species?

Here you can see a photo presentation which speaks more about the importance of biodiversity.

Sara Jeswani - Sustainability

May 23, 2010

Looking for new solutions to limit emissions

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parliament-presentation
Discussing the personal energy quote system in the halls of the old Parliament building.

We all do things that we love and fear at the same time. Listening to scientists talking about climate change is perhaps my love-and-fear favourite. Yesterday I attended a seminar held in the beautiful halls of the old Parliament buildning here in Stockholm. There Johan Rockström, who is director of Stockholm Environment Institute, stated (once again) that the world is in a big hurry if we want to avoid runaway climate change. Yet these emissions have never globally been rising as much as during this last decade when that we have tried reducing them.

Now, he concluded, we must be ready to try new ideas.

The purpose of this seminar was just that, presenting the idea of a personal carbon rationing system that has earlier been discussed in the UK and is now gaining interest here in Sweden.
One of the speakers was the British Dr David Fleming, who has developed the Tradable Energy Quotas system.

The idea behind it builds on putting a limit to the total emissions, and thereafter splitting the right to emit equally between the citizens of a nation. Those who need to exceed their quota would have to buy extra quotas from those who don’t use theirs. In that way people who emit less than their entitlement would actually make economic gains on it.

The system is a bit complicated and not very easy to explain, but the discussion that followed yesterday, between promoters and opposers of these ideas, was heated. Those who are against it argued that a system where all air travels and other energy consuming activities are registered would be a threat to our personal integrity, and meant that a carbon tax is the best way of reducing emissions (read more about the Swedish carbon tax in this article in The Guardian).

Those who advocate personal emission permits argued that this is the most fair way of distributing the right to pollute, and that there is no guarantee that taxation will actually keep the emissions below the limits we set up.

Although a bit technical, I find these discussions extremely interesting. But I cannot help feeling a bit of fear as well, with the words of Johan Rockström echoing in my head. By 2015 global emissions must start going down, he says,reaching almost zero by year 2050.
That means we haven’t got much more time to spend on discussions.

Sara Jeswani - Sustainability

May 20, 2010

Transition in Sweden

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The transition group of Alingsås gathers to make new visions for their city. Photo: Omställning Alingsås.

Ever felt that much needs to be done in order to save the planet, but that the world leaders are taking their time? After going to the climate summit in Copenhagen last year, this was my feeling, and I know I’m not alone. The transition movement is made up of thousands of small initiatives around the world, wanting to start the work of making society less dependant on fossil fuels and more adjusted to the limits of our planet.

In Sweden, the movement was officially launched last autumn and there are already about 70 transition initiatives allover the country, where people gather to discuss what can be done at the local level. But they are not just talking: practical action is an important part of it too. For example I have been in contact with the group of my old hometown Alingsås, where the transition group has organised a food growing training course. In other places, there are workshops about how to make your own electricity, carpools are started and clothes-swap parties are arranged.

Often there these groups also connects with the local politicians, in order to influence how the city or region is structured and planned, and to talk about what could be done at that level. Making it easier for local food producers to sell their products to people living in the area is just one example.

But there are no predetermined answers to how to make this transition, Janne Forsmark who works as a project leader for Omställning Sverige (as the Swedish transition network is called) points out to me.
“We don’t want to tell people how they should do this, we are just offering ideas, thoughts and a lot of enthusiasm. THis is just the start of a big social experiment. A new movement”, he says.

I suppose he is right. Changing our society from one which is heavily dependent on fossil fuels will require lots of imagination and new ideas.

Sara Jeswani - Sustainability

May 17, 2010