http://www.naturalnews.com/024417.html
NaturalNews) This year saw the first commercial planting of genetically modified (GM) sugar beets in the United States, with that sugar to hit the food supply soon after.
Farmers across the country will soon be planting Monsanto's Roundup Ready sugar beet, genetically engineered for resistance to Monsanto's herbicide glyphosate (marketed as Roundup). John Schorr, agriculture manager for Amalgamated Sugar, estimates that 95 percent of the sugar beet crop in Idaho will be of the new GM variety in 2008, or a total of 150,000 out of 167,000 acres.
Approximately 1.4 million acres of sugar beets are planted in the United States each year, primarily in Minnesota and North Dakota's Red River Valley, as well as the Pacific Northwest, Great Plains and Great Lakes areas.
In response to the anticipated flood of GM sugar onto the food market, the consumer group Citizens for Health has launched an email campaign to pressure three major sugar and candy companies to refuse the new product. In 2001, American Crystal Sugar, Hershey's and M&M Mars all promised that they would not use GM sugar; Citizens for Health is asking consumers to email those companies from the group's Web site and urge them to keep that promise.
"Since half of the granulated sugar in the U.S. comes from sugar beets, the infiltration of GE sugar beets represents a significant alteration of our food supply," Citizens for Health says on its Web site. "Unlike traditional breeding, genetic engineering creates new life forms that would never occur in nature, creating new and unpredictable health and environmental risks."
In 1999, candy companies' refusal to purchase GM sugar scuttled Monsanto's first attempt to introduce Roundup Ready sugar beets.
On another front, a coalition of farmer and environmental groups is seeking to block the planting of the GM beets through a federal lawsuit. The plaintiffs in the case - the Center for Food Safety, High Mowing Organic Seeds, the Organic Seed Alliance and the Sierra Club - are represented by lawyers from the Center for Food Safety and Earthjustice.
In 2005, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) changed the classification of Roundup Ready sugar beets from regulated to deregulated, meaning that the GM beets could be planted without a special permit. But the lawsuit alleges that the USDA failed to properly conduct an environmental review into the impacts of this deregulation.
"The law requires the government to take a hard look at the impact that deregulating Roundup Ready sugar beets will have on human health, agriculture and the environment," said Greg Loarie of Earthjustice. "The government cannot simply ignore the fact that deregulation will harm organic farmers and consumers, and exacerbate the growing epidemic of herbicide resistant weeds."
Critics point out that Roundup Ready crops encourage increased chemical use, with dangerous effects on both human health and the environment. In addition to contaminating soil and water, pesticides leave potentially dangerous residue on food plants themselves.
Citizens for Health says that this is a particular concern in light of the Environmental Protection Agency's recent compliance with a Monsanto request to increase the allowable levels of glyphosate residue on sugar beet roots by 5000 percent.
"Sugar is extracted from the beet's root, and the result is more glyphosate pesticide in our sugar," the group said.
Another concern is that such plants encourage the development of "superweeds" that are resistant to Roundup.
"Just as overuse of antibiotics eventually breeds drug resistant bacteria, overuse of Roundup eventually breeds Roundup-resistant weeds," said Kevin Golden of the Center for Food Safety. "When that happens, farmers are forced to rely on even more toxic herbicides to control those weeds."
USDA data reveals that in the 10 years after the 1994 introduction of Roundup Ready crops, herbicide use increased by 15 times. This has led to a concurrent increase in superweeds. While no cases of Roundup-resistant weeds were known in the U.S. corn belt in 2000, this year the roster of such weeds includes marestail, common and giant ragweed, waterhemp, Palmer pigweed, Cocklebur, lambsquarters, morning glory and velvetleaf.
Ninety-nine percent of U.S. superweeds are resistant to Roundup.
GM crops may also cross-breed with non-GM plants of the same or closely related species. The primary seed-growing region for sugar beets - the Willamette Valley of Oregon - is also a major seed-growing area for the closely related organic chard and table beets. Since all these species are wind pollinated, the chances of contamination are very high.
"Contamination from genetically modified pollen is a major risk to both the conventional and organic seed farmers, who have a long history in the Willamette Valley," said Matthew Dillon, director of advocacy for the Organic Seed Alliance. "The economic impact of contamination affects not only these seed farmers, but the beet and chard farmers who rely on the genetic integrity of their varieties."
Crops contaminated by cross-pollination with GM varieties can no longer be certified organic.
Since corn syrup is an even more widely used sweetener than sugar and the majority of corn grown in the United States is also Roundup Ready, food safety advocates note that nearly all sweetened food in the United States will soon be GM. Because U.S. law does not require labeling of GM ingredients, consumers of products from candy to breakfast cereal will soon be unknowingly exposed to engineered sugar, with unknown health consequences.
"As a consumer, I'm very concerned about genetically engineered sugar making its way into the products I eat," Neil Carman of the Sierra Club said.
Courtesy
Sangita Sharma
Monday, July 6, 2009
Holistic foods, a subject very close to my heart, over the recent years is fast contaminated.
Greetings from "MY RIGHT TO SAFE FOOD"
Holistic foods, a subject very close to my heart, over the recent years is fast contaminated.
As i watch the plight of millions of consumers frequenting hospitals with their loved ones especially children with their diet so dependent from the very basics like white sugar, white pasta, white bread, white rice, white milk, made to look pure but in reality a poison. More appalling is the diet in hospitals for patients which comprise most of the above. Many times, I request my doctor friends and ask them if they can do something about it. Yet to happen!
Lets take artificial white sugar which robs the body of its Vitamin B. It is that portion of Vitamin B called Thiamine and many other valuable minerals which is destroyed necessary for growth, good appetite, smooth functioning of the digestive tract. It plays so big a part in nerve health that it is called the "morale" vitamin. Thiamine is stolen from our bodies by these robber foods - white sugar, synthetic sugar, white flour, white bread, cereals and many refined and processed foods.
If you eat jaggery and carbohydrates in natural forms, you do not expereince any thiamine deficiency nor alow the body to steal thyamine from its storage reserves in liver, kidney and heart. If you eat white sugar daily you are almost bound to suffer from thyamine deficiency and if you are a heart case such a dietary habit is cold suicide. Sugar + Vitamin B deficiency = HEART TROUBLE.
If you do not believe me, kindly read a 68 potent book called "Sugar - The curse of Civilisation" by J J Rodale.
From the supermarket shelves, rows of glistening, jewel-coloured jellies, cakes, biscuits and jams, sparkling fruit juices beckon invitingly. Packaged well, most contain commercial glucose or corn syrup made by treating corn starch with sulfuric or hydrochloric acid. The resulting syrup is then neutralised with soduim carbonate and decolourised with carbon or bone black.
Refer chapter 7 "Glucose - A synthetic food". Leading diabetic authority Dr Lee, Dr Joslin of Boston says there is an increase in the present trend of diabetes. Much of the responsibility for this frightening prediction can be laid at the door of glucose or corn syrup.
According to Dr Quigley, M.D of Omaha, synthetic glucose must be suspected as being a cause of cancer, for he found it impossible to treat successfully some types of cancer until all traces of glucose were eliminated from the patients diet. He further says let the chemist say what they like but our bodies are not designed for synthetic foods. You feed your cells/body rubbish and they will lose their identity and revert into forms that can better live upon rubbish.
Glucose blocks the assimilation of calcuim, the most impotant element to strenghten us against many different kinds of disease. It also destroys amino acids which forms proteins, most required category of food and health. This causes fatigability and nervousness then brings toxic symptoms of liver disease and obesity.
Look at your shopping list and see the amount of junk bought for children's lunch boxes as well as fast processed foods..Horrific. NO matter how rushed you are, no matter how meagre the food budget, make efforts to avoid buying commercially prepared foods like jams preserves, jellies, ketchups, ice creams, bakery products, cereals.
Indulge and get back to making your own recipes with fresh fruits and vegetables. Trust me, it is only a matter of shift in our mind sets and attitudes. We bake our own bread, biscuits, cakes, fruit conserves, pickles etc...and mind you although we are rushed off our feet, we still make the time! Both urban and the rural consumers have become lazy and so dependent on the retail shops for their basics. In villages, we teach farmers to get back nutritional traditional diets with basics....whilst sharing and preparing recipes, they look at me and say " My grandmother used to prepare this..."
Involve children, treat your families to the age old tradition of making your own sweets with cane sugar, jaggery or date syrup. You will save not only on finances but also curb your visits to pharmacies and hospitals...Take charge of your food, its time to wake up.
Earlier it was refined white sugar, now its GM sugars which are further killers. The Organic Consumers Association (OCA) has called for a boycott of the Kellogg Company, also known as Kellogg’s, after the company refused to sign a pledge refusing to use genetically modified sugar in its cereal products.Sugar from genetically modified sugar beets hit the U.S. market for the first time this year, making the beets the first genetically engineered crop to enter the U.S. food stream since the widespread introduction of modified corn and soy in the 1990s. The sugar has been modified by the Monsanto Corporation to be resistant to the company’s signature herbicide, Roundup. Read on......
In solidarity
Sangita Sharma
http://myrighttosafefood.blogspot.com/
Holistic foods, a subject very close to my heart, over the recent years is fast contaminated.
As i watch the plight of millions of consumers frequenting hospitals with their loved ones especially children with their diet so dependent from the very basics like white sugar, white pasta, white bread, white rice, white milk, made to look pure but in reality a poison. More appalling is the diet in hospitals for patients which comprise most of the above. Many times, I request my doctor friends and ask them if they can do something about it. Yet to happen!
Lets take artificial white sugar which robs the body of its Vitamin B. It is that portion of Vitamin B called Thiamine and many other valuable minerals which is destroyed necessary for growth, good appetite, smooth functioning of the digestive tract. It plays so big a part in nerve health that it is called the "morale" vitamin. Thiamine is stolen from our bodies by these robber foods - white sugar, synthetic sugar, white flour, white bread, cereals and many refined and processed foods.
If you eat jaggery and carbohydrates in natural forms, you do not expereince any thiamine deficiency nor alow the body to steal thyamine from its storage reserves in liver, kidney and heart. If you eat white sugar daily you are almost bound to suffer from thyamine deficiency and if you are a heart case such a dietary habit is cold suicide. Sugar + Vitamin B deficiency = HEART TROUBLE.
If you do not believe me, kindly read a 68 potent book called "Sugar - The curse of Civilisation" by J J Rodale.
From the supermarket shelves, rows of glistening, jewel-coloured jellies, cakes, biscuits and jams, sparkling fruit juices beckon invitingly. Packaged well, most contain commercial glucose or corn syrup made by treating corn starch with sulfuric or hydrochloric acid. The resulting syrup is then neutralised with soduim carbonate and decolourised with carbon or bone black.
Refer chapter 7 "Glucose - A synthetic food". Leading diabetic authority Dr Lee, Dr Joslin of Boston says there is an increase in the present trend of diabetes. Much of the responsibility for this frightening prediction can be laid at the door of glucose or corn syrup.
According to Dr Quigley, M.D of Omaha, synthetic glucose must be suspected as being a cause of cancer, for he found it impossible to treat successfully some types of cancer until all traces of glucose were eliminated from the patients diet. He further says let the chemist say what they like but our bodies are not designed for synthetic foods. You feed your cells/body rubbish and they will lose their identity and revert into forms that can better live upon rubbish.
Glucose blocks the assimilation of calcuim, the most impotant element to strenghten us against many different kinds of disease. It also destroys amino acids which forms proteins, most required category of food and health. This causes fatigability and nervousness then brings toxic symptoms of liver disease and obesity.
Look at your shopping list and see the amount of junk bought for children's lunch boxes as well as fast processed foods..Horrific. NO matter how rushed you are, no matter how meagre the food budget, make efforts to avoid buying commercially prepared foods like jams preserves, jellies, ketchups, ice creams, bakery products, cereals.
Indulge and get back to making your own recipes with fresh fruits and vegetables. Trust me, it is only a matter of shift in our mind sets and attitudes. We bake our own bread, biscuits, cakes, fruit conserves, pickles etc...and mind you although we are rushed off our feet, we still make the time! Both urban and the rural consumers have become lazy and so dependent on the retail shops for their basics. In villages, we teach farmers to get back nutritional traditional diets with basics....whilst sharing and preparing recipes, they look at me and say " My grandmother used to prepare this..."
Involve children, treat your families to the age old tradition of making your own sweets with cane sugar, jaggery or date syrup. You will save not only on finances but also curb your visits to pharmacies and hospitals...Take charge of your food, its time to wake up.
Earlier it was refined white sugar, now its GM sugars which are further killers. The Organic Consumers Association (OCA) has called for a boycott of the Kellogg Company, also known as Kellogg’s, after the company refused to sign a pledge refusing to use genetically modified sugar in its cereal products.Sugar from genetically modified sugar beets hit the U.S. market for the first time this year, making the beets the first genetically engineered crop to enter the U.S. food stream since the widespread introduction of modified corn and soy in the 1990s. The sugar has been modified by the Monsanto Corporation to be resistant to the company’s signature herbicide, Roundup. Read on......
In solidarity
Sangita Sharma
http://myrighttosafefood.blogspot.com/
Sunday, June 14, 2009
GREEN FESTIVAL : GREEN UNPLUGGED!
http://www.cultureunplugged.comtransformed through time, traditions & trends.
How do you see it today?
Fundamentally, does the Green mean,
consciousness growing,
in harmony, in atomic - cosmic world?
Spiritually, does the Green mean
organic, dynamic, expansive spirit
enveloping you, me, them & us,
in dark, deep & bright - loving, blissful experience?
Materially, does the Green mean
translucent lean layer, live in human mind, heart & gut
separating & sifting, our greed & need?
Some of us seeking to unearth & unravel Green again
on seeing nature in ruffle, times in shuffle.
Green placards in hand,
they shout, show and won't let us shrug
about present picture of mother nature.
how do you see?
Is nature transforming or dying?
In chorus with mother nature,
do you also cry for change,
for new world, new future, new you, me & us?
Will you drink the Green potion
to dream and claim spiritual materialism anew?
Will you sing n say :
I choose,
customizable religion,
transparent relationships,
world citizenship.
I buy,
conscious consumption,
cultural selection,
creative communication.
I want,
spiritual society,
compassionate community,
harmonized humanity.
tell me brother, my sister, my friend
how far are we from the world in our dream?
is it time for Green, Unplugged...?
for more info
http://www.cultureunplugged.com
Plastic-bag billboard a world first
Janine Erasmus
Leading South African financial services provider Nedbank is once more setting the pace in good environmental practice, with a billboard made entirely of recycled plastic bags at Johannesburg's OR Tambo International Airport.
Claiming that "Only one bank can truly call itself the green bank", the billboard was hand-made by a group of seven crafters, all of whom are the breadwinners in their families. It took six weeks and more than 2 000 recycled plastic shopping bags to make the remarkable 40m-long advertisement.
Nedbank's head of marketing Greg Garden said the new creation showed the bank's commitment to doing things differently, and would hopefully serve as an example and inspiration to South Africans.
"Too many South Africans don't understand the need to recycle as a way of preserving our environment," commented Garden in a statement, "and this billboard represents just one of Nedbank's efforts to change this mindset and demonstrate the practical application of recycling principles in everyday life."
With its Climate Change Position Statement issued in March 2009, Nedbank became the first South African bank to make a firm pledge to reduce its impact on the environment in terms of energy, water and paper usage, as well as carbon emissions.
The banking group has set targets of a 12% reduction in energy and carbon emissions by 2015, as well as a 5% water and 10% paper reduction by 2010.
Positive impact
The resourceful advertising agency in charge of the Nedbank brand is Cape Town-based Net#work BBDO.
BBDO's executive creative director Rob McLennan said the Nedbank campaign was an example of how the agency is building its clients' brands whilst maintaining an awareness and respect for environmental matters.
"This billboard has created jobs, married advertising with social conscience, showcased our local artistry and has removed some of the country's non-biodegradable rubbish," he said.
Although reusable plastic shopping bags are considered better for the environment than paper bags because they need less energy to produce, transport and recycle, a bag may take hundreds of years to degrade.
Award-winning innovation
This is not the first time Nedbank has shown that it has a conscience where the environment is concerned, and has turned that conscience into innovation.
In 2006 its first solar-powered billboard in Alexandra township, east of Johannesburg, won the Outdoor Grand Prix at the prestigious Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival.
Said to be the world's first solar-powered billboard, it is titled "Power to the People" and has 10 solar panels. Harnessing the fierce power of the African sun, each panel generates 135 watts of power that provides energy for the MC Weiler Primary School in Alexandra, in whose grounds the billboard stands.
The school saves over US$240 (R2 000) a month in electricity fees and furthermore can supply a hot meal daily to its 1 100-plus pupils, many of whom will not get a decent meal anywhere else. Stored energy gathered from the solar panels during the day lights the billboard at night.
The ground-breaking hoarding swayed the jury with its contribution to the upliftment of the community. Jury chair Jean-Remy von Matt described it as work that continues to work and to provide, in contrast with the many short-lived promotions that ultimately serve little or no purpose.
According to Net#work BBDO, the power generated is enough to boil 18 1-litre domestic kettles continuously at any one time.
Helping the community
Towards the end of 2007 Nedbank's second solar billboard was installed at the Athlone Youth and Family Development Centre in Athlone on the Cape Flats, south-east of the Cape Town city centre. However, this one also has a wind turbine for extra power generation, providing energy for the kitchen, security lights and geysers. This drastically cuts the community centre's monthly electricity bill.
The centre works with youth in the area, many of whom come from troubled homes and have become drug addicts and school dropouts. It provides a home for to up to 22 youngsters at a time, helping them to overcome their addiction, go back to their families, and rebuild their lives.
Director Sydney Dicks described the billboard as a godsend, saying that it has enabled the centre to install a 200l solar-powered geyser and two security floodlights as well as slash the monthly bill.
* Do you have queries or comments about this article? Contact Janine Erasmus at janinee@mediaclubsouthafrica.com This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
courtesy
http://www.mediaclubsouthafrica.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1141:nedbank-plastic-billboard-220509&catid=42:land_news&Itemid=110
Leading South African financial services provider Nedbank is once more setting the pace in good environmental practice, with a billboard made entirely of recycled plastic bags at Johannesburg's OR Tambo International Airport.
Claiming that "Only one bank can truly call itself the green bank", the billboard was hand-made by a group of seven crafters, all of whom are the breadwinners in their families. It took six weeks and more than 2 000 recycled plastic shopping bags to make the remarkable 40m-long advertisement.
Nedbank's head of marketing Greg Garden said the new creation showed the bank's commitment to doing things differently, and would hopefully serve as an example and inspiration to South Africans.
"Too many South Africans don't understand the need to recycle as a way of preserving our environment," commented Garden in a statement, "and this billboard represents just one of Nedbank's efforts to change this mindset and demonstrate the practical application of recycling principles in everyday life."
With its Climate Change Position Statement issued in March 2009, Nedbank became the first South African bank to make a firm pledge to reduce its impact on the environment in terms of energy, water and paper usage, as well as carbon emissions.
The banking group has set targets of a 12% reduction in energy and carbon emissions by 2015, as well as a 5% water and 10% paper reduction by 2010.
Positive impact
The resourceful advertising agency in charge of the Nedbank brand is Cape Town-based Net#work BBDO.
BBDO's executive creative director Rob McLennan said the Nedbank campaign was an example of how the agency is building its clients' brands whilst maintaining an awareness and respect for environmental matters.
"This billboard has created jobs, married advertising with social conscience, showcased our local artistry and has removed some of the country's non-biodegradable rubbish," he said.
Although reusable plastic shopping bags are considered better for the environment than paper bags because they need less energy to produce, transport and recycle, a bag may take hundreds of years to degrade.
Award-winning innovation
This is not the first time Nedbank has shown that it has a conscience where the environment is concerned, and has turned that conscience into innovation.
In 2006 its first solar-powered billboard in Alexandra township, east of Johannesburg, won the Outdoor Grand Prix at the prestigious Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival.
Said to be the world's first solar-powered billboard, it is titled "Power to the People" and has 10 solar panels. Harnessing the fierce power of the African sun, each panel generates 135 watts of power that provides energy for the MC Weiler Primary School in Alexandra, in whose grounds the billboard stands.
The school saves over US$240 (R2 000) a month in electricity fees and furthermore can supply a hot meal daily to its 1 100-plus pupils, many of whom will not get a decent meal anywhere else. Stored energy gathered from the solar panels during the day lights the billboard at night.
The ground-breaking hoarding swayed the jury with its contribution to the upliftment of the community. Jury chair Jean-Remy von Matt described it as work that continues to work and to provide, in contrast with the many short-lived promotions that ultimately serve little or no purpose.
According to Net#work BBDO, the power generated is enough to boil 18 1-litre domestic kettles continuously at any one time.
Helping the community
Towards the end of 2007 Nedbank's second solar billboard was installed at the Athlone Youth and Family Development Centre in Athlone on the Cape Flats, south-east of the Cape Town city centre. However, this one also has a wind turbine for extra power generation, providing energy for the kitchen, security lights and geysers. This drastically cuts the community centre's monthly electricity bill.
The centre works with youth in the area, many of whom come from troubled homes and have become drug addicts and school dropouts. It provides a home for to up to 22 youngsters at a time, helping them to overcome their addiction, go back to their families, and rebuild their lives.
Director Sydney Dicks described the billboard as a godsend, saying that it has enabled the centre to install a 200l solar-powered geyser and two security floodlights as well as slash the monthly bill.
* Do you have queries or comments about this article? Contact Janine Erasmus at janinee@mediaclubsouthafrica.com This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
courtesy
http://www.mediaclubsouthafrica.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1141:nedbank-plastic-billboard-220509&catid=42:land_news&Itemid=110
Thursday, May 28, 2009
India'a first Green Store is Launched!
INDIA'S FIRST GREEN STORE in BangaloreYour search for healthier, affordable organic and natural food for – that is nourishing, tasty and good for the environment ends here.
Mother Earth is launched … for fashionable choices in garments and accessories that are natural and stylish as well as sustainable and fair, …for gifts and home décor that keep our green hand skills alive.
Industree and Future Group present Mother Earth, India’s first Store focusing on Sustainability, both environmental and social.
Offering you sensible options, along with reputed partners like Sewa, Sasha, Cottage Industries Emporium, amongst others. Browse through three floors of exciting green choices – that combine the best of hand skills and natural materials with best of contemporary design.
Our Address
541 - 543, Amarjyothi HSBC Layout, Opposite Dell, Koramangala Intermediate Ring Road, Domlur, Bangalore.
about MotherEarth showroom.
India’s first green store.
Providing retail space for a bunch of sustainable brands.
11000 sq feet – totally dedicated to green-eco friendly and sustainable products
Providing markets for primary producers
Following Fair trade standards – motherearth is a fair trade certified brand
A noble attempt to propogate sustainable consumption among Indian urban consumers
www.motherearth.co.in
Jack Fruit Festival by URAVU
Check this out, its gonna be great!
Jack Fruit Festival by URAVU
from June 5th to 7th, 2009
Have fun!
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
Direct, Naked, Taut, Honest, Passionate, Lean, Shivering, Startling, and Graceful
Poonam Kasturi
Daily Dump
When I was invited to give this speech, I was asked if I could give a simple short talk that was “direct, naked, taut, honest, passionate, lean, shivering, startling, and graceful.” Boy, no pressure there.
But let’s begin with the startling part. Hey, Class of 2009: you are going to have to figure out what it means to be a human being on earth at a time when every living system is declining, and the rate of decline is accelerating. Kind of a mind-boggling situation – but not onepeer-reviewed paper published in the last thirty years can refute that statement. Basically, the earth needs a new operating system, you are the programmers, and we need it within a few decades.
This planet came with a set of operating instructions, but we seem to have misplaced them. Important rules like don’t poison the water, soil, or air, and don’t let the earth get overcrowded, and don’t touch the thermostat have been broken. Buckminster Fuller said that spaceship earth was so ingeniously designed that no one has a clue that we are on one, flying through the universe at a million miles per hour, with no need for seatbelts, lots of room in coach, and really good food – but all that is changing.
There is invisible writing on the back of the diploma you will receive, and in case you didn’t bring lemon juice to decode it, I can tell you what it says: YOU ARE BRILLIANT, AND THE EARTH IS HIRING. The earth couldn’t afford to send any recruiters or limos to your school. It sent you rain, sunsets, ripe cherries, night blooming jasmine, and that unbelievably cute person you are dating. Take the hint. And here’s the deal: Forget that this task of planet-saving is not possible in the time required. Don’t be put off by people who know what is not possible. Do what needs to be done, and check to see if it was impossible only after you are done.
When asked if I am pessimistic or optimistic about the future, my answer is always the same: If you look at the science about what is happening on earth and aren’t pessimistic, you don’t understand data. But if you meet the people who are working to restore this earth and the lives of the poor, and you aren’t optimistic, you haven’t got a pulse. What I see everywhere in the world are ordinary people willing to confront despair, power, and incalculable odds in order to restore some semblance of grace, justice, and beauty to this world. The poet Adrienne Rich wrote, "So much has been destroyed I have cast my lot with those who, age after age, perversely, with no extraordinary power, reconstitute the world." There could be no better description. Humanity is coalescing. It is reconstituting the world, and the action is taking place in schoolrooms, farms, jungles, villages, campuses, companies, refuge camps, deserts, fisheries, and slums.
You join a multitude of caring people. No one knows how many groups and organizations are working on the most salient issues of our day: climate change, poverty, deforestation, peace, water, hunger, conservation, human rights, and more. This is the largest movement the world has ever seen.
Rather than control, it seeks connection. Rather than dominance, it strives to disperse concentrations of power. Like Mercy Corps, it works behind the scenes and gets the job done. Large as it is, no one knows the true size of this movement. It provides hope, support, and meaning to billions of people in the world. Its clout resides in idea, not in force. It is made up of teachers, children, peasants, businesspeople, rappers, organic farmers, nuns, artists, government workers, fisherfolk, engineers, students, incorrigible writers, weeping Muslims, concerned mothers, poets, doctors without borders, grieving Christians, street musicians, the President of the United States of America, and as the writer David James Duncan would say,the Creator, the One who loves us all in such a huge way.
There is a rabbinical teaching that says if the world is ending and the Messiah arrives, first plant a tree, and then see if the story is true. Inspiration is not garnered from the litanies of what may befall us; it resides in humanity’s willingness to restore, redress, reform, rebuild, recover, reimagine, and reconsider. "One day you finally knew what you had to do, and began, though the voices around you kept shouting their bad advice," is Mary Oliver’s description of moving away from the profane toward a deep sense of connectedness to the living world.
Millions of people are working on behalf of strangers, even if the evening news is usually about the death of strangers. This kindness of strangers has religious, even mythic origins, and very specific eighteenth-century roots. Abolitionists were the first people to create a national and global movement to defend the rights of those they did not know. Until that time, no group had filed a grievance except on behalf of itself. The founders of this movement were largely unknown – Granville Clark, Thomas Clarkson, Josiah Wedgwood – and their goal was ridiculous on the face of it: at that time three out of four people in the world were enslaved. Enslaving each other was what human beings had done for ages. And the abolitionist movement was greeted with incredulity. Conservative spokesmen ridiculed the abolitionists as liberals, progressives, do-gooders, meddlers, and activists. They were told they would ruin the economy and drive England into poverty. But for the first time in history a group of people organized themselves to help people they would never know, from whom they would never receive direct or indirect benefit. And today tens of millions of people do this every day. It is called the world of non-profits, civil society, schools, social entrepreneurship, and non-governmental organizations, of companies who place social and environmental justice at the top of their strategic goals. The scope and scale of this effort is unparalleled inhistory.
The living world is not "out there" somewhere, but in your heart. What do we know about life? In the words of biologist Janine Benyus, life creates the conditions that are conducive to life. I can think of no better motto for a future economy. We have tens of thousands of abandoned homes without people and tens of thousands of abandoned people without homes. We have failed bankers advising failed regulators on how to save failed assets. Think about this: we are the only species on this planet without full employment. Brilliant. We have an economy that tells us that it is cheaper to destroy earth in real time than to renew, restore, and sustain it. You can print money to bail out a bank but you can’t print life to bail out a planet. At present we are stealing the future, selling it in the present, and calling it gross domestic product. We can just as easily have an economy that is based on healing the future instead of stealing it. We can either create assets for the future or take the assets of the future. One is called restoration and the other exploitation. And whenever we exploit the earth we exploit people and cause untold suffering. Working for the earth is not a way to get rich, it is a way to be rich.
The first living cell came into being nearly 40 million centuries ago, and its direct descendants are in all of our bloodstreams. Literally you are breathing molecules this very second that were inhaled by Moses, Mother Teresa, and Bono. We are vastly interconnected. Our fates are inseparable. We are here because the dream of every cell is to become two cells. In each of you are one quadrillion cells, 90 percent of which are not human cells. Your body is a community, and without those other microorganisms you would perish in hours. Each human cell has 400 billion molecules conducting millions of processes between trillions of atoms. The total cellular activity in one human body is staggering: one septillion actions at any one moment, a one with twenty-four zeros after it. In a millisecond, our body has undergone ten times more processes than there are stars in the universe – exactly what Charles Darwin foretold when he said science would discover that each living creature was a "little universe, formed of a host of self-propagating organisms, inconceivably minute and as numerous as the stars of heaven."
So I have two questions for you all: First, can you feel your body? Stop for a moment. Feel your body. One septillion activities going on simultaneously, and your body does this so well you are free to ignore it, and wonder instead when this speech will end. Second question: who is in charge of your body? Who is managing those molecules? Hopefully not a political party. Life is creating the conditions that are conducive to life inside you, just as in all of nature. What I want you to imagine is that collectively humanity is evincing a deep innate wisdom in coming together to heal the wounds and insults of the past.
Ralph Waldo Emerson once asked what we would do if the stars only came out once every thousand years. No one would sleep that night, of course. The world would become religious overnight. We would be ecstatic, delirious, made rapturous by the glory of God. Instead the stars come out every night, and we watch television.
This extraordinary time when we are globally aware of each other and the multiple dangers that threaten civilization has never happened, not in a thousand years, not in ten thousand years. Each of us is as complex and beautiful as all the stars in the universe. We have done great things and we have gone way off course in terms of honoring creation. You are graduating to the most amazing, challenging, stupefying challenge ever bequested to any generation. The generations before you failed. They didn’t stay up all night. They got distracted and lost sight of the fact that life is a miracle every moment of your existence. Nature beckons you to be on her side. You couldn’t ask for a better boss. The most unrealistic person in the world is the cynic, not the dreamer. Hopefulness only makes sense when it doesn’t make sense to be hopeful. This is your century. Take it and run as if your life depends on it.
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