Blog #11

The following blurb is from Osgood Sustainability Consulting’s website. I read it while researching the term “sustainable consumerism” and couldn’t manage to alter it to describe it in my blog- so here it is, quoted from them: “One of the world’s most pressing issues is that humans are consuming beyond our means. We are in debt both to our planet’s ecosystems and to the financial mechanisms that keep our economies growing.According to many scientists, we are currently consuming at least two planet’s worth of natural resources, stripping away the core ecosystems upon which we rely for food, water, shelter and inspiration. At the same time, above a certain level of income, consuming “more” does not make us any happier. It does not create meaning in our lives, nor does it leave us healthier or feeling more connected to our communities.” Another website quoted that if every person in the world live like average Americans, we’d need five planets to live off of. That, to me is terrifying and embarrassing. Globalization and capitalism are to blame- negatively. Greenwashing means that the consumer is tricked into thinking that a product or production of a product is eco-friendly. My family and I already pay premium prices for organic foods. There aren’t many local markets in this area, but when we visited Cincinnati, Ohio, we went to a huge fantastic market that only sold local grown and raised goods. The restaurants only used the foods from the vendors within the same market. It is called Findlay Market. We would love to have a market like that here in Naples, or at least Ft. Myers. That being said, if there were more mom and pop stores, we would certainly frequent them more. I do quite a bit of shopping at a local Haitian market when I run out of spices and special things that I cannot buy at the regular grocery store. I do refuse to shop at Whole Foods or Trader Joes for the majority of our groceries because I do believe that the prices are jacked up just to serve the retailer’s name. Holistically, we try to make the right decisions, economically and ethically. Sometimes it can be difficult.