blog

the dehumanisation of production

Sun, 02 Oct 2011 01:42:56 +0000

I was watching the video below. It is about a comedian and actor, Mike Daisey, who discusses technology in his shows. He seems rather eloquent.

He sings praises to new technology, such as i-phones, but then explores the dehumanising conditions under which a lot of these products are made. It made me think. Imagine we had the opportunity to meet the people who worked on products we purchase. Imagine we could meet the Japanese engineers who constructed our cars, the Thai fishermen who caught our squid, the Portuguese potter who made our crockery. As you know, this opportunity only exists for very few products.

In contrast, what if we found out that a person died or these producers worked in slave-like conditions to create our car, catch our squid or throw our tea cup? Would we still enjoy our product? I guess we all know that these facts are hidden from us because we all know the answer: knowing how stuff is made is bad for business.

Now, let's make a funny leap. We may say that the Chinese should change their world - that it is up to them to decide on production methods - and so on. That child labour is supposed to create a middle class in China, or whatever. I wonder about this - because it is this middle class who has created this ultra-capitalist system. It is this middle class that fuels the international trade in body parts of endangered species such as rhinoceros horns, elephant tusks and shark fins. Yes - it is up to China to choose its destiny - but by integrating commerce with them - we become an integral part of this abusive system.

This may sound a bit like an anti-China rant and I should say that this applies to any part of the world where factories operate under deprived conditions. Furthermore, the main point of this entry is to make the link between "i dont care how it is produced" consumption patterns and a detoriation of our own world.

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GM in Australia

Thu, 29 Sep 2011 23:19:04 +0000

Australian Television recently broadcasted an interesting show in genetically modified (GM) crops. There are lots of ways to change crops, GM being the fastest way to do so. Consumers are worried about that. Some scientists also believe that there are not enough safety checks. That is a long debate. It is hard to prove that something is unsafe by saying we don't know enough about it. The people developing new crops are obviously focussing on the positive aspects. Consumers, especially the ones that are naturally cynical about big business and technology, will focus on the (potential) dangers.

However, an important aspect that is easily overlooked is the ecology that comes with growing food. That is, you can have the fanciest gm tomatoes that grow to the size of melons - but they still need a healthy environment for growing. One of the farmers interviewed made the point that healthy soil may actually lead to the expression of many good genes. If we would genetically modify our kids to be smarter, then we would still need to educate them and look after their mental and physical health. The business model of having huge plantations of gm cash crops being grown in the same soil year after year will create a rotten ecology.

One of the examples used in the program was an Australian program to make wheat healthier by genetically modifying it. What we are doing here is adjusting our plants to our diet. It is a bit like modifying chocolate because everyone eats it. What is ironic is that while we are creating some new organisms, many, many more are lost, forgotten and ignored. These are all the heirloom plants. The famous example is corn. Where we used to grow thousands of varieties of corn, we now grow just a few "super" strains. This is another big risk in commercialising plant species. We increase risk by lowering diversity.

spoon

Wed, 28 Sep 2011 10:19:14 +0000

I just saw this picture on my facebook (thank you Ben). It is an interesting one. I guess there are a few things that are not addressed:

1. to make the metal spoon also involved a similar trail from mine via factory to user

2. plastic spoons are made by the millions - making the individual spoon very cheap and easy to make.

3. in washing the spoon we may use half a litre of water and perhaps put some dish washing liquid into our water

Of course, it is better to reuse a spoon. I guess the challange might come in making it easier to wash to spoon and more expensive to use a throw-away one. If this was the case then McDonalds would start using metal reusable cutlery. I would be very interested to see the economics of this. Has anyone ever worked this out?

potential

Fri, 19 Mar 2010 09:00:00 +0000

At the end of the last century, I was doing some volunteer work in Nicaragua for a local Christian organisation. One day, the big boss asked me to visit a farmer up north to find out about his organic production. The only question I basically had to answer was how he managed to save costs on sending products to market - : United States. Airfreight costs were very high (at that time the local airlines of Central America tended to charge a fortune for anything on which they had a monopoly). Two days later, I took an early bus up north. The farm I was visiting was around five hours north of Managua. It was run by a dude from the US together with his his stunning Central American wife. I had no idea what to expect. After the long bus ride, I finally arrived in the small Nicaraguan village, in a more mountainous part of the country. For those who have been to Central America - you can probably imagine the beauty and charm. It is small, but full of people and fresh produce everywhere. I was picked up by Rodrigo in his pick-up. He took me straight to his farm. To my great disappointment, it was nothing more than a barren soccer field, perhaps two or three, but nothing else. It was a tiny farm in a this large country. However, the story that Rodrigo shared with me painted different picture. He told me how a tiny little seed here in the ground would one day grow up to be a beautiful onion. How these onions would be harvested one day and be packed in 45 minutes and then how two days later, someone in Manhattan would be pay $2.00 for each onion. It was the precision, organisation, commitment and teamwork, all working together to market this small natural wonder. What you have to understand is that Nicaragua was (and certainly still is) very poor. Even Rodrigo, the rich foreign land owner, was actually very poor. The year before, his crop had been wiped out by Hurricane Mitch. He was close to bankruptcy. We went back to his tiny little house. It was empty. I was surprised there was even little to eat. Just Rodrigo, his wife and the vision they shared. They were dirt poor, but a few years later they were a success story. Everything about my visit that day was about potential. You could read potential in everything Rodrigo said and did. His committment, the beautiful land, the people. Here is his story: http://www.iadb.org/idbamerica/index.cfm?thisid=661.

famous Cuban example

Sun, 23 Aug 2009 11:58:46 +0000

It comes back over and over again, the Cuban example of agriculture: [url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8213617.stm/]Cuban Example - The vegetable gardeners of Havana [/url]. This is now happening in lots of places around the world, where people are growing food right in their own cities.

excited about the start

Sun, 25 Jan 2009 15:08:16 +0000

We have just completed a basic layout for the site and some of the core functionality is working. It is really nice to see how it is all coming together. I am stoked about the images that we have introduced as well. The next big things are to make it easy to add suppliers and to make a list of certifying organisations. The latter will then be used to get a whole data directly from certifying agents. The goal is to complete this by the end of February. Let's see if we can find some people to help! Everyday I am checking to see how many visits I get and if anyone is (trying to) enter data. So far, not much, but it is growing for sure...