Sustainable Living

The United Nations declared the years 2005 – 2014 as the Decade of Education for Sustainable Development (ESD). Here in New Zealand the Decade was launched at the Eco-show in Waitakere City last year. The NZ coordinating committee’s priority is to better communicate about sustainability and get more people engaged in taking action for sustainability.

Here on Rainbow Valley Farm my wife Trish and I have provided education on sustainable living and permaculture to many people from many countries over the last 20 years or so. In this column I can share some of my knowledge with you for the next months to come. So watch this space.

The topics will be Zero Waste, how to minimise your ecological footprint, growing food organically by creating edible landscapes, becoming more energy efficient by retrofitting your home, renewable energy, passive solar design, smart shopping, avoiding food miles, appropriate technology, and lots more that make it possible to live a more self-reliant and sustainable life - although the word sustainability is over-used. Most consumption and activities in our present lifestyle are ecologically not sustainable long term.

The end of cheap oil (oil peak) is another reason to redesign our way of consuming the resources we have. Once we have a good understanding of the TRUE COST (EMERGY – the embodied energy in a product or activity) it makes sense to take responsibility and not pass on the costs to future generations.

The quadruple bottom line (environmental, social, economic and cultural costs) is a start to not externalising the true costs. We have to learn to live off the interest of nature, not from unrenewable capital. A high degree of ecological literacy and ecological competence throughout the population, especially our decision makers, will make it possible to future-proof human existence on this planet. We need to adapt to the limits of the earth, for that we have to know the carrying capacity of our life-supporting ecological systems. Environmental deterioration represents a political failure in the way we make decisions, the distribution of power and wealth and in leadership at all levels. Issues of environmental sustainability are complex and long-term, while politics addresses mainly immediate issues. Short term gain, long term pain. We will need to reinvent politics at the eco-system level. Democracy must begin at home and home is the community and bioregion one lives in and isn’t our region a beautiful one?

The concept of sustainability implies a radical change in the institutions and patterns that we have to accept as normal - we need to go from mechanical to organic, from industrial to biological - maybe democracy will be replaced by biocracy one day.