[Valeria101]

Originally Posted by Slraep

Just like I wasn't talking politics, .... Are there still people who think global warming, pollution and the use of "green" products are propaganda?

Originally Posted by CortezPearls

I agree entirely. One of the reasons why people are changing their consumption habits is to enjoy a healthier life...

We may be speaking of different things. As sustainability issues seem rather different depending where and how one lives...

I don't eat hamburgers, and locally McDonalds is still allot more expensive than the farmer's market. Of course, that means that the farmers cannot afford to buy the hamburgers!

For this country, recent environmental progress came not by willing policy, but due to the sudden collapse and profound changes of the economy that also brought in unthinkable human costs. Poverty does not bring better health.

I cannot agree that anyone may ask anyone else to buy a higher moral standard. No matter how wealthy the buyer might be. Re-arranging social distribution seems to be possible by policy, but the ethics involved remains a tad over my head. The mechanisms involved in the success stories (taken from international comparisons at national level this time) seem to be above the individual level though, and problematic enough.

Global warming ... I was glad to see policy shifting firmly to global level. Take the recent Stern review, and the impending revision of the Kyoto agreement this autumn: it is 'think globally act globally' for them. The evaluation of Kyoto in Vienna a couple of weeks ago was rather less glamorous than the press release had it, but... that's still better than many other global initiatives (especially development aid).


I doubt we are on opposite sides of the fence. Perhaps seeing the problem from different perspectives, rather. And I am not saying I have it right.

[Slraep]

Originally Posted by Valeria101

I cannot agree that anyone may ask anyone else to buy a higher moral standard.

Hi Ana,

No, I doubt we are on the opposite side of the fence too, I beleive that you worry just as much as I do, but I still do not understand what the "higher morality" brand you are using has anything to do with environmental issues. I personally think it is immoral to plug CRAP to an unsuspecting, or over-trusting public. As of today, there is a commercial running on TV here put on by the Canadian cancer society saying that now statistics show that one out of two people will be stricken with cancer. That's terrifying. So please forgive my "higher moral standard" and anyone else's when we try to knock some environmental sense into the average Joe. I do not trust government to rectify the problems we are having. Our environmental problems are best solved by public reluctance to buy and consume CRAP. It is everyone's duty to stop dragging their feet and become involved. I saw first hand how the US government "helped" some of my friends in New Orleans after the disaster, so don't hold your breath thinking government will do anything to remedie the environment, until maybe the last moment when there is no more potable water and we are gasping for air.

Where is the logic in allowing the earth's poor to pollute the earth because they and their families are starving, when that same pollution will sicken them and ultimately kill them with an iffy prospect as to the continuation of the survival of their offspring?? Or ours. No, I maintain my position in urging everyone to become proactive and do something. Let us encourage the sane and innovatively healthy alternatives and refuse the destructive polluting CRAP. Even if the good stuff costs a couple dollars more.

It's funny you mention not eating hamburgers!

Meet(or should I say, meat)---> THE BIONIC BURGER
http://www.thebestdayever.com/burger.htm

Slraep

[Slraep]

Originally Posted by CortezPearls

I really think it is a question of Survival of the Human race and our Planet, a question all sentient beings should ask. And to rephrase JFK's wonderful phrase: "Ask not what your Country can do to Save the Environment, but what you as a Human can do to save your Planet".
Every little bit counts.

Douglas, I think you are fully tuned in to the ailing earth because you have seen first hand with your own eyes what the effect of pollution is doing to our oceans and ocean life, and it has sent a jolt throughout your entire being. You are right, we have the power, as individuals to save our planet. Most of the time, though, we need a little push or information that scares the bejesus out of us to get us off our behinds.

Slraep

[Valeria101]

Originally Posted by Slraep

I do not trust government to rectify the problems we are having.

That the US government? Right then.

Whether others can really do it well all the way is a good question, but there's still way better out there (Northern Europe, I would think).

What can/does motivate government action in each case is yet another very good question... US is quite a case.

Our government?

Originally Posted by Slraep

Our environmental problems are best solved by public reluctance to buy and consume CRAP.

OK. I guess that's the one point of divergence between our beliefs: about means of action rather then ends.

Originally Posted by Slraep

Where is the logic in allowing the earth's poor to pollute the earth because they and their families are starving...

I am aware that this 'right to pollute' has already been claimed during the Kyoto negotiations and elsewhere. It sounds wrong to me as much as it does to you.

Imposing trade and financial barriers against developing countries in the name of environmental standards also seems rather wrong. At least as long as alternatives to the use of polluting technologies are not made accessible one way or another. Using the vulnerable economics of developing nations to shift pollution to them is even worse.

For now, I am not ready to believe that making US buyers feel guilty about their consumption is going to address all this or even kick start significant change. It seems quite a leap of faith... for a chronically skeptic having spent a good number of years feeding the sustainable development policy research on both sides of the Atlantic. When I have started, I had way more enthusiasm and way less doubt myself.

These days, it comes less easy to state my beliefs in a short post or two. It is helpful to hear how they sound infront of an open forum though! Back to the drawing board...

[CortezPearls]

Heck, I am only 37 years old and I remember the World I grew up in...and it is already different from this one. My children have seen less live animals, less blooming flowers in the Sonoran dessert than those I saw when I was younger. Toads for instance...we had so many toads after the rainy season, now all I find are rocks, mud and trash. And this goes for everything...tidal pools were full of live beings, the ocean brought a vast array of life every other day: giant Humboldt calamari, vast amounts of beautiful red praws, giant blue shrimp, giant zebra urchins, the massive kelp forests, fin whales giving birth in front of you...seems all is gone. Nothing there for my children to experience...this cannot be the World we will inherit. And I remember very clearly it was during 1997's Niño when things started happening, when the Mexican economy was in shambles and the poor people started fishing everything out, also when PET bottles became more abundant.

Governments? They SHOULD represent the people...we ARE the people. Then IT IS US who should be doing something, politicians are having way much fun in their Macchiavelian plots. And we can either start a violent war against each other or start a war against IGNORANCE... Education is our first line of defense. And if you SELL or BUY something (we all do) then you can HELP by educating yourself and by educating others as well. No big thing. Just try to do the right thing!

Guilt might work on a customer, but my toughts are on the opposite side of the fence... will it make you feel better??? No need to focus on the negative aspect, instead settle for the positive: you ARE doing something good...and not only for you, but for countless others

This world needs more teachers and less politicians. I am not trying to go into a pointless debate here...the forum is about Pearls, somehow one thing led to another. Maybe we should just STOP this thread and find a better -more suited- forum. But it was good to vent this all out...whoa!

[Josh]

Hi everyone. This is pretty heady company with Danuta, Ana and Douglas laying it all out. I think it is progressive stuff and it's good to see that it has a place in the world of pearls.
I wanted to bring the thread back around though and say that as Doug pointed out, how we farm pearls is a sum of choices we make. We can either do it sensitively with respect and love for the environment and it's creatures or we can do it otherwise.
Where my farm in the Tuamotus the fish populations have actually exploded. As on Doug's farm in Baja, we don't fish in our waters (unless you are under 8 or over 80). The fish are more numerous around and under our farm than anywhere on the atoll. On a glassy day it's like a giant aquarium. We clean our oysters by putting them in special zones that the fish can access. For every type of bio-fouling (sponges, anemones, parasitic oysters, sea mats, etc, etc) there is a fish species that corresponds to it. This means that the fish that profit from our farming are diverse in size and species so no one species gets the upper hand.
Then there is how the social structure of the farm is set up as well. The longer you have been there, the more you climb the ladder in the company. Everyone is treated with respect and our team actually stays on the farm for the holidays! Think about working on a tiny atoll with less than 10 other people for five months, non stop. Wouldn't you want to see some bright lights, maybe a movie, a dance club? They know where the best party is going to be, just like every year.
Anyway, my point is that we are free to choose, whether it be how we run a pearl farm, buy a pearl, or pick our party.

[Valeria101]

Originally Posted by Josh

Think about working on a tiny atoll with less than 10 other people for five months, non stop.

'Bet the small island makes you guys really see where the boundaries of environmental damage are (close, that is).

Sometimes, working very close from home in a small office, really long hours ... feels like living on an island too. I doubt any island could take the amount of all-around carelessness folks in this town show for their commons. Bad as it is now, it used to be so much worse!

[Slraep]

Proper perliculture includes the well being of both your patch of sea and the people who work it. Another problem with how we live is not only the stress we put on the environment but the stress people create in their daily lives. It seems most have lost the ability to connect to the natural world around them. We forget---nature has no equal, and technology has surpassed our common sense and compassion even towards ourselves.

What we do with our free time and how we spend that dollar is actually the most powerful thing we can use to change the world. More power to you who care for the environment.

Danuta

[Josh]

What we do with our free time and how we spend that dollar is actually the most powerful thing we can use to change the world. More power to you.

Danuta[/quote]

Danuta, I appreciate hearing that. Never really thought of it that way.

[Kevin Canning]

those damn surfers - always such hippies eh Josh

[Josh]

Kevin, I'm kickin myself not being able to remember that movie that came out years ago about the two Canadians who have adventures a la Bill and Ted and say things like "hoser eh," all the time. Oh no, the death of another good thread.

[Slraep]

Is it The McKenzie Brothers movie? "Strange Brew; the Adventures of Bob & Doug McKenzie"

And the guys pronounce it "hosier", eh. But it's spelled "hoser", eh. Hoser, eh.

Slraep

[Josh]

Brilliant. Strange Brew right on the tip of my tongue. Thanks Danuta for the help in the deterioration of that thread.
Kevin, that's the voice in my head when I read your comments, eh.

[Valeria101]

Originally Posted by Slraep

Way to go Josh!!! What a wonderful ecologically sound picture you paint of your pearling endeavour.

Right that! Now... I can imagine that for a good part of the environmental mvement that candid picture would be anatema - as almost any interference of man in nature. And some would not touch pearls because they are animal products... And yet others ... There's always an argument.

[Josh]

Anathema:
someone or something that is detested or abhorred.
Dutch: anathema (het)
French: abomination (f)
German: Greuel (nt)
Italian: anatema
Spanish: algo repugnante u odioso

I had to google it and thought I'd share with the rest as illiterate as me.
I'll take those extremists on though.
What's neat about Tahitian pearls is that the pearl is not the end of the line for the oyster (like for Akoyas). After the first pearl is extracted, the pearl is replaced by a successive nucleus, thus the oyster lives on. I will also explain to them that we do everything imaginable to provide optimum lives for our oysters: keep them at a depth where the levels of oxygen and phytoplacton are tops as well as periodically clean them to keep them free of parasites. The truth is that cultivated Tahitian oysters have the good life compared to their brethren on the sea floor.
Also, pearls are secretions; products from animals (molluscs really) not of them.
I know that some even turn their noses up at honey as it's an "animal product" too. I think we should rejoice though as that just means more pearls and honey for the rest of us.
It's important to point out that some pearl types are farmed in a way that doesn't compromise the wellbeing of the oysters or the environment. Pearls really can be the perfect gem.