sustainabili-dit
Let’s Let’s Talk Talk About: About: Sustainability Sustainability and and Culture Culture
Has sustainability become white-washed? Is there room for more than just aesthetic eco-branding? Should we all just aspire to become zero-waste vegans?
WORDS BY Ingrid Mowbray
The face of the sustainability movement has become crowded with images of keep cups, compost bins and metal straws. I confess that in the past few years I have focused on making these switches and encouraged those around me to do the same. While there is nothing inherently wrong with inching closer to being waste free (do keep using your metal straw!). The sustainability space appears tunnel visioned when it comes to this, compared to the need to appreciate the intersectionality of other cultures and the environment.
26 26
We can learn a lot more about sustainable practices through observing other cultures— look… our plastic free inventions are great, but these alternatives have existed elsewhere and have survived our high consumption society (but let’s save the conversation of capitalism and sustainability for another time). More importantly, I want to highlight our need to understand the choices that some consider to be ‘killing the planet’ but are also significant cultural practices. But what do I mean? I understand the power of examples, so bear with me! My very cutting-edge story: in a rural village in China, a man catches a fish to feed his family of five for the Lunar New Year. He recreates a traditional recipe, which involves dousing the fried fish with brown vinegar, garlic and
sugar (these may be ingredients I have stolen from my mum). Should we tell this family to go vegan? Perhaps your answer would be different if I described how the man didn’t catch his fish, but instead bought the fish from Woolies. The point I’m making isn’t that only one of these men deserve to eat fish and the other does not. It’s about perspective— along with cultural, environmental and socio-economic factors that are important to reflect upon. However, I hope it’s recognised that in the former example sustainable fishing can exist, but the latter involves sourcing from commercial fishing—which is damaging to ocean habitats and unsustainable for the planet. Did you know that commercial fishing operations sometimes use a technique called ‘bottom trawling’ to catch things living on the seafloor (like shrimp and scallops), which scientists say are similar to the destruction caused by cutting forests? You may be more familiar with the concept of ‘bycatch’, which occurs when unintended species such as sharks or turtles are caught in the longline fishing technique. But enough with the facts…these points can be found via some research on Google. To bring to life my point on sustainability and culture, it is within the culture of the Inuit people (an arctic indigenous population) to hunt seals for food and
