By Kate Marie Phillips
“Open Your Eyes” is a bimonthly column seeking to expand our realm of awareness beyond the everyday tunnel-vision perspective—to encourage readers to more consistently notice the often overlooked social and environmental impacts we have upon the world, and find ways of reforming our day-to-day lives to evolve into more conscientious human beings.
Over spring break I engaged in an discussion with a good, world-travelling friend of mine. Our discussion steered toward the troubles of the world, and a simple question arose: how can the United States survive as a global power if its government, companies, and citizens blatantly ignore and exacerbate the problems of Third World countries?
Whether directly or indirectly, companies of the First World are attempting to export their issues. By outsourcing jobs to countries having little or unenforced employment regulations, companies have less stringent policies to carry out which they often find is cheaper, and ultimately easier. They are often not required to provide fair wages, safe working environments, or opportunities for advancement. Another issue is how we are destroying developing nations’ environments through processes including oil drilling, deforestation, and mining. Companies will swoop in to lesser educated areas, provide the local people with a quick, monetary incentive, and violate their land beyond those financial means, leaving the locals in devastated environments. Finally, as another environmental issue, the filling of Third World land via imported First World trash and toxic waste, we are rendering ecologically stable environments toxic and unviable.
In this system, consumers of the industrialized, democratic world — just like you and me — are misled into believing that they have shaken themselves free of the environmental and social consequences of these actions — something I call “blind consumerism”. This is not the case. For instance feel the repercussions via price hikes due to conflict in the Middle East, strife in other oil-producing countries. To address the social implications of foreign labor, we must also confront the reality that a great portion of the workers in our meat industry within the United States are illegally imported aliens from Mexico. These people take jobs in the US and abroad because it may seem like a step up from what they are used to, but we are exploiting their labor by giving them unfairly low wages and unclean and toxic working environments. Also, the increase of polluted air in our atmosphere that is circumventing the globe from producers like China, India, and Russia, adding to the already decreasing quality of American air. The United States and other First World consumers are the indirect problem of this system, not realizing — as well as simply ignoring — these inhumane processes, exploitation of resources, and global consequences that make up the A to Z of our products.
Focusing upon First World countries, especially the citizens of the United States, it is easy to find millions of people living such ignorant lifestyles. Mindlessly purchasing products that give consumers little reason to trust beyond flamboyant advertising upon further investigation. Blind consumerism is an issue for almost any product on the market, from food to home appliances. Take a traditional pencil for example. National Geographic, in an effort to educate children at an early age, has formulated simple lessons and activities to address the basics of complex issues. In their lesson, “Geography of a Pencil: How is the world connected to the pencil you hold in your hand?”, NatGeo puts forth a few questions: “What materials or natural resources make up a pencil?” Most of us know the answers: graphite for the lead, wood to house the lead in a shaft, paint to decorate it, rubber for the eraser, and aluminum to attach the eraser to the shaft. Next they ask students to “discuss the geographic origins” of these materials. Utilizing only five different materials, NatGeo explains the pencil you’re holding is already connected to approximately five to 10 of the following countries: graphite from Brazil and Mexico, wood from Sweden and South Africa, paint from Kazakhstan and Estonia, rubber from Thailand and Malaysia, and aluminum from China and Mozambique. Of these, only one, is a First World country.
Beyond giving these facts, NatGeo helps students to begin understanding the complexity trade and “that many resources from many different countries are needed to make even the most simple, everyday objects. [Although] many countries … are geographically distant from each other [they] are intricately connected through the trade of goods and services.” Herein, the issues of the matter lie in distinguishing the bad from the good, the renewable from the unsustainable, ethical from the unjust and reliable versus the questionable.
Third party certification organizations have blossomed in light of these issues that give consumers peace of mind when purchasing products. After preparing a set of guidelines for a company to meet, the certification organization will send inspectors to rigorously investigate and decide whether the company meets them. As far as the shaft of pencils, and other lumber or wood-containing products such as paper are concerned, the most reliable certifier would be the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC), who describe themselves as “an independent, non-governmental, and not-for-profit organization established to promote the responsible management of the world’s forests.” To further their credibility, the FSC has obtained membership with two international organizations including the International Social and Environmental Accreditation and Labelling Alliance (ISEAL) and the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). Other reliable third party certifiers, also member to either of these international organizations include the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC), Social Accountability Accreditation Services (SAAS), and Fairtrade Labelling Organizations International (FLO). Together, these and other members of ISEAL and IUCN are striving towards sustainable, ethical, and reliable product and company certification.
But upon whose shoulders does the responsibility truly fall? Although companies, in an effort to protect the resources that they rely on for their survival, are pushing for certification, the consumers are ultimately the most important part of the system. Companies depend on consistent need for their products. Once consumers begin to voice their needs and wants, companies will tailor their products accordingly. As we can see from the fast food industry, negative results can follow from such a system. The most important thing that customers want of the fast food industry is cheap food fast. Food quality and the processes from farm to restaurant are topics that are typically less prominent on consumers’ minds. In recent years, however, pressure from within this consumer base — upon gaining more understanding of environmental and social issues — has begun influencing the way these companies operate.
From CEO’s to consumers, people are the key to resolving the issues of globalization that continue to divide the First from the Third World. As Mahatma Ghandi once said, “No culture can live if it attempts to be exclusive.”