NEW ZEALAND HUMAN ENVIRONMENT RELATIONSHIPS

This is a research report I have done at uni for Environmental Anthropology looking at the impacts of agriculture on our environment and the relationships we have with our environment in New Zealand.  To begin to think more about how our economy, business and food production are being put ahead of our natural environment.  Little green steps for this week, start to think about these issues and how we contribute to them.

Food production is a huge industry that is necessary for human survival and yet the practices we promote within this industry are having significant impacts on our natural environment.  With the increasing environmental degradation in New Zealand and in fact in the world today it is important to consider the human/environment relationships that may contribute to these practices.  In this assignment I will look at the history of agriculture and the human environment relationships of the early European colonial culture that established it.  I will then look at the impact of agricultural practices on New Zealand’s natural environment and how they were influenced by the relationships and attitudes of settlers.  Then I will consider how these historical perspectives shaped contemporary New Zealand human/ environment relationships and the intensification of agriculture and what impact this has had.  What I will show is that European colonial culture has profoundly influenced the human/environment relationships that have led to environmental degradation and ecological crisis through agricultural practices today.

I have chosen this topic for my research report because it is an issue particularly close to me.  I live in a farming community in rural northland, New Zealand with my immediate family that includes three small children.  Before I was aware of the potential health risks due to agricultural practices I took my children swimming in the river across the road and in the lagoon at our local beach and believed that I was doing great things for their health being in a country environment surrounded by nature.  I have since learnt that there are many aspects of intensive agriculture that are degrading not just my own local environment but also the New Zealand environment in general.  Because of this I have become deeply concerned about not just the health of my family and the wider New Zealand community but also with our natural environment that we rely on for survival.   

Historically New Zealand agriculture and the human/environment relationships associated with it, have roots in European colonial culture, which was based on ideals of progress, expansion, capitalism and economic growth and permeated with Christian thought.   The English explored the world with the objective of expanding their empire and British navigators such as Captain James Cook reported back on the resources available in the countries he visited and whether those countries were suitable for British settlement to achieve this expansion (Wilson, 2009, n.p).  After his exploration and circumnavigation of New Zealand beginning in1769, Cook concluded that the abundance of trees to feed industrial growth and the environment itself made it a desirable location for potential settlement.  But according to Geoff Park (1995), Cook played a far larger role than that of navigator in what was to be the beginning of a dramatic change in the New Zealand environment, he states

“James Cook was as much an agent of industrialised agriculture as a great navigator.  It was his Endeavour that first brought ashore Europe’s intent for plains country like this, his men who implanted the seeds of ecological change in this soil the moment they saw the giant trees it grew, laying the groundwork for the food trade that has joined together the earth’s extremes (p.59). 

Over the next 70 New Zealand’s natural resources were exploited by sealers, whalers and traders but it wasn’t however until after 1840 and the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi that European colonisation and settlement occurred on a large scale.  Agricultural growth followed on from this settlement and the colonial settlers began clearing large areas of land for farming.  The economy of the time certainly influenced the human/environment relationships in New Zealand.  Between 1850 and the 1970s the highest value exports from this country were initially wool and then also meat and dairy and this early pastoral economy relied on these exports for growth (Easton, 2011, n.p).  It was therefore an economic necessity to clear land for pasture and increase the number of animals on the land with little regard for the natural environment.  In order for the country to develop economically products for export had to be produced. The natural environment was therefore dispensable because it was worth far less as native forest than it was in pasture. So capitalism drove the settlers to modify the New Zealand landscape and influenced their relationship with the land, a separate entity worth sacrificing for economic benefit.  The religious view of this colonial culture also profoundly shaped the way they saw and treated the natural environment.  In fact, some have argued that because of the way the relationship between humans and nature was conceived by Christianity, it was the most harmful to the environment of all major religions (Garden, 2005, p.67).   The Christian relationship of man to the natural environment can be seen in this quote, “as the earth has been created for the use of man, it is against the laws of Providence that it should be kept in a wild state of nature” ( Maori Messenger, 1857, p.2).  It was therefore against the colonists religious beliefs to leave land uncleared or untilled and these beliefs contributed to the attitude of settlers that it was necessary to tame and control nature, in fact it was a religious duty.  These beliefs created a division between humans and nature and all other sentient beings, man was superior to all other living things in the natural world as everything had been created for man.  The influence of Christianity was not the only cultural influence on the human environment relationship of the colonial settlers.  They also had an idealized vision of what New Zealand landscape should look like.  Just from the title of his book, New Zealand or Zealandia the Britain of the South, Charles Hursthouse (1857) indicates the connection between New Zealand and Britain and the desire to recreate some aspects of Britain in New Zealand and he goes on to show the British attitude towards the natural environment,  “The natural scenery of New Zealand is both bold and beautiful; though to an English eye, accustomed to trim fields, clipped hedges, and to the smooth-rolled, finished look of every acre in England it would frequently appear more bold than beautiful…this stock of ‘raw beauty’, is a fertile cultivable country; where plough and sickle and mill would singularly enrich and brighten the landscape” (p.98).  They saw that there was potential in the New Zealand landscape but it would be necessary to modify it dramatically for it to be reminiscent of the English landscapes, for it to be fit with their religious beliefs and to be economically productive.

The impact of agriculture and the detached human/environment relationship between the European colonial culture and the New Zealand environment led to profound ecological damage and change.  This occurred through major deforestation, soil erosion, the introduction of foreign species of grasses and weeds, use of chemical herbicides and nutrient deficiency in soil.  The first act against nature that the settlers took was the clearing of land.  They cleared the land by felling trees and burning stumps, any undesirable trees and all undergrowth, including native tussock grasslands but they also drained wetlands removing forests from these areas and converted them to pasture.  Large areas of tussock lands and half of New Zealand’s forest had been converted into pastures by 1930 and by the Second World War 85% of wetlands had been drained and converted as well (Haggerty and Campbell, 2009, n.p.).  Once the land was cleared introduced grass species were planted out, unfortunately in addition to grasses, weeds were also introduced.  Weeds such as gorse, which was introduced as hedging but became a major problem, proliferated in the New Zealand climate and since the 1930s have required the use of chemical herbicides to control them (Popay, 2009, n.p.).  Also the additional animals being grazed and the conversion to pasture affected the soil fertility and so it became necessary to use fertilizers such as superphosphate. Another impact has been soil erosion.  This is a consequence of deforestation as tree roots stabilized the subsoil so when settlers converted land to pasture and then farmed animals on that land the soil became unstable and eroded in many areas (Gregg, 2009, n.p). 

In contemporary New Zealand, the dominant, rationalist, capitalist culture has been influenced by the detached human/environment relationships of their predecessors and the market economy and because of this agriculture is continually being expanded and intensified at the expense of the environment. The detachment of humans from their natural environment as seen in the example of the New Zealand colonial culture can be seen in the dominant culture today.  Val Plumwood (2002) describes this type of detachment and the impact of these relationships on the environment, “Rationalism and human/nature dualisms have helped create ideals of human culture and identity that promote human distance from, control of and ruthlessness toward the sphere of nature as the Other…” (p.4).  This type of detachment is augmented because of the reliance on agriculture by the New Zealand capitalist, market economy as it has been since the colonial period.  Statistically for the period ending June 2011, agriculture exports contributed 25 billion dollars to the New Zealand economy and accounted for 58% of the total exports (Ministry of Agriculture, 2011).  This shows that from an economic perspective agriculture is still very important to the economy and the economy is what drives New Zealand’s dominant culture as it participates in the world market.  The result of this is that today there is an estimated 70,000 farms that cover half of the New Zealand’s land area (Haggerty & Campbell, 2009, n.p).  Another result of the detached relationship and increasing economic drive of market capitalism has been ecological crisis in New Zealand.  This crisis is unfolding in many ways.  Agriculture contributes to carbon emissions and therefore climate change.  Agriculture produces 49% of the total greenhouse gas emissions in New Zealand from livestock, animal excrement and nitrogen fertiliser (Ministry for the Environment, 2008, n.p) and the production of greenhouse gases from farming is contributing to the warming of earths atmosphere and severe climate change (Ministry for the Environment, 2010, n.p.).  This is a global issue but one that will significantly impact on the future of both people and the environment in New Zealand.  Declining water quality has been attributed to the intensification of pastoral farming from waste and nitrogen run off which causes eutrophication of lakes and rivers, contamination of shellfish and threats of extinction to native freshwater fish and plants as well as threatening biodiversity (Profitt, NIWA, n.p).  The declining water quality has also made many areas unsafe for swimming and fishing, favourite New Zealand past times.  There is a trend throughout the history of agriculture in New Zealand and that trend is that with the expansion of this industry comes further environmental degradation.  The more intensive it becomes the more there are damaging consequences for the natural environment in New Zealand.  There is evidence of this everywhere and yet the efforts to mitigate these issues have been relatively minimal.  I believe that this is because we have inherited disconnected relationships with our natural environment from our European predecessors and that in our culture, economic value outranks the value of nature.  We see nature as disposable and disconnected from ourselves.  Money however is considered an intricate part of our lives but we don’t see nature the same way.  And yet we are absolutely reliant on our natural environment for survival.  Val Plumwood (2000) indicates that it is a failing of the dominant rationalist culture that we are unable to see that humans depend on the ecological order for survival (p.5) and I wholeheartedly agree.  The relationships between humans and the environment in Western culture contribute our destruction of it as Donald Worster so aptly puts it,

“Here it is true in the West which we see reflected in the modern irrigation ditch.  It is, first and most basically, a culture and society built on, and absolutely dependent on, a sharply alienating, intensely managerial relationship with nature…Quite simply the modern canal, unlike a river is not an ecosystem.  It is simplified, abstracted Water, rigidly separated from the earth and firmly directed to raise food, fill pipes and make money” (Cited in Tvedt & Jakobsson, 2006, p.xix)

This understanding gives us the opportunity to address environmental issues from a different perspective.  Rather that looking at the issues themselves as the problem we need to look more to ourselves, how our culture and our relationships with the environment have led to these issues.

Through exploring the human/environment relationships of the dominant culture, my culture, in this country I have had to explore my own relationship with the environment and consider my contribution to the degradation.  I now feel a much greater sense of responsibility and connectedness to my natural environment.  I feel passionate about reducing my impact on the environment, learning more about sustainable management of this precious and live giving part of ourselves and helping to educate others about how we can collectively make changes to alleviate the damaging impact we are having on it.  I believe a deeper connection to our environment engenders this deeper sense of responsibility and may encourage others to look at how they live and what impact it is having.  As Val Plumwood stated “A more unified place relationship…can be a wonderful instrument or voice for communication with and sensitivity to the earth and other humans.”  (Plumwood, 2008, n.p).

The human/environment relationships of the European colonial culture in New Zealand significantly influenced contemporary culture and our attitudes to our environment that has led to degradation of the environment through agriculture.  Agriculture and human/environment relationships in New Zealand have roots in European colonial culture, which was based on notions of expansion, progress, capitalism, and economic growth as well as Christian ideals.  These cultural beliefs and ideals combined with agriculture led to significant ecological damage and change.  These human/environment relationships also influenced contemporary New Zealand culture and their relationships and attitudes toward nature and this combined with a market economy has led to the expansion of agriculture at a significant cost to the environment. This exploration of the relationships that my culture have with the environment has led to personal revelations in my own life and a commitment to contribute to change.

References

Easton, Brian. 'Economic history - Early pastoral economy', Te Ara - the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, updated 18-Jan-11
URL: http://www.teara.govt.nz/en/economic-history/4

Garden, Donald Stuart.  Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific: An Environmental History, Santa Barbara: ABC-CLIO inc, 2005.

Haggerty, Julia. Campbell, Hugh. 'Farming and the environment - Early changes', Te Ara - the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, updated 1-Mar-09.  Retrieved October 12^th, 2011 from
URL: http://www.TeAra.govt.nz/en/farming-and-the-environment/2

Hursthouse, Charles.  New Zealand or Zealandia the Britain of the South, 1857, retrieved October 10^th, 2011 from &chttp://www.enzb.auckland.ac.nz/document?wid=840&page=0&action=null

Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry.  “Primary sector export values for the year ending June 2011”, International Trade: Agricultural and forestry exports from New Zealand, Last Updated: 06 October 2011,  Retrieved October 17^th, 2011 from  http://www.maf.govt.nz/agriculture/statistics-forecasting/international-trade.aspx

Ministry for the Environment. “What is climate change?”  Climate Change Information, New Zealand, November 2010.  Retrieved October 17^th, 2011 from http://www.climatechange.govt.nz/science/what-is-climate-change.html

Ministry for the Environment. Factsheet 21 - Agriculture in the emissions trading scheme ministry for the environment, September 2008.  Retrieved October 17^th, 2011 from http://www.mfe.govt.nz/publications/climate/emissions-factsheets/factsheet-21.html

Park, Geoff.  Nga Uruora: the Groves of Life, Ecology and History in a New Zealand Landscape, Wellington: Victoria University  Press, 1995.

Plumwood, Val.  Environmental Culture:  The Ecological Crisis of Reason, London: Routledge, 2002.

Plumwood, Val.  “Shadow Places and the Politics of Dwelling”, Eco-Humanities Corner.  Retrieved 19^th October, 2011 from http://www.australianhumanitiesreview.org/archive/Issue-March-2008/plumwood.html

Popay, Ian. 'Weeds of agriculture', Te Ara - the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, updated 1-Mar-09
URL: http://www.teara.govt.nz/en/weeds-of-agriculture

Proffitt, Fiona.  “How clean are our rivers?”  NIWA Taihoro Nukurangi, Retrieved October 18^th 2011 from http://www.niwa.co.nz/news-and-publications/publications/all/wa/vol.-18-no.1-july-2010/rivers.

Statistics New Zealand.  Agricultural Production Statistics: June 2010, May 12^th , 2011.  Retrieved October 16^th, 2011 from, http://www.stats.govt.nz/browse_for_stats/industry_sectors/agriculture-horticulture-forestry/AgriculturalProduction_HOTPJun10final.aspx

Tvedt, T.  Jakobsson, E.  “Introduction: Water History is World History” in A History of Water: Water control and river biographies. London: I.B.Tauris & Co, 2006.

Wilson, John. 'European discovery of New Zealand - James Cook', Te Ara - the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, updated 4-Mar-09, retrieved from
URL: http://www.TeAra.govt.nz/en/european-discovery-of-new-zealand/4

HOUSEHOLD CLEANING PRODUCTS

 
The human spirit needs places where nature has not been rearranged by the hand of man.  ~Author Unknown

UPDATE ON PERSONAL CARE PRODUCTS

The personal care products challenge I gave myself last week continues.  I have tried egg yolk facemasks, made a moisturizer out of beeswax and olive oil, used baking soda to wash my hair, apple cider vinegar as a conditioner and lemon as a deodorant.  The baking soda is quite drying and the vinegar doesn’t really help with that, so I’ll keep experimenting with hair stuff!  The moisturiser is lovely but maybe not for everyone, great for dry skin.  What was interesting was the facemask.  The eggs came from my own free-range chooks and the mask was literally just egg 2 egg yolks mixed up with a fork, applied to the face and left for ½ an hour.  Pretty simple and effective, left my skin feeling soft and moisturized but I did, however, find the smell a bit weird!  The lemon seems to work fine, mind you I haven’t been running or anything and its not the exactly the height of summer!  I’m going to try some lemongrass essential oil; apparently you can mix a few drops with water in a spray bottle and use that as a deodorant.  My theory is that if I start with basic recipes as I progress, ill try some of the more complicated ones.  As for soap and hand wash I have been using up what’s left in the house, but I have tried soap nuts.  You boil a handful in 2 cups of water and simmer for 10 minutes, then use the liquid for almost everything.  I have used an old liquid honey bottle (yay for re-using!) and tried it as shampoo and hand/body wash.  The results have been OK but I think I need to add some lavender essential oil for its natural antibacterial qualities and the lavender scent and find some way of thickening it up.  The soap nut shop (1) suggests you add 1 to 2 teaspoon of either Guar Guar Gum or Xanthum Gum to thicken it but I don’t yet know what either of these are or where to get them so will have to look into it.

HOUSEHOLD CLEANING PRODUCTS

Week two’s ‘little green step’ is to do with household cleaning products.  I was talking to my grandmother about this and she said when she was younger all that was really used for cleaning was a bar of soap.  This was used for washing clothes, dishes, homes and bodies!  But today we have a different cleaner for everything!  Floor cleaner, glass cleaner, dish liquid or dishwasher power, toilet cleaner, disinfectant, bleach, oven cleaner, carpet cleaner, carpet deodoriser, spray cleaners of all kinds, furniture polish, not to mention odour removing, bacteria reducing, air sanitizers!  Marked as antibacterial, whitening, streak free, hospital grade etc these products are going to help us achieve germ free, dirt free, sparkling, gleaming and sterile homes.  Well great, but what else are they going to do??

Lets start with the environmental impacts of these chemicals.  The New Zealand Ministry for the environment when discussing soaps and cleaning chemicals states that the “chemical content and the process of manufacture and disposal can pose hazardous risks to the environment and to human health.  Cleaning products used indoors are typically washed down drains to treatment plants where biodegradable toxic compounds may break down to safer chemicals, but non-biodegradable toxic chemicals will pass through untreated. Products used outdoors will make their way to storm water drainage systems. Both routes will contribute to pollution of our natural environment. The manufacturing process and disposal of chemicals and packaging also present an avenue for toxic chemicals to pollute the environment.” (2).

So just like the chemicals from personal care products the chemicals from our cleaning products are entering our waterways.    Chemicals from detergents such as alkylphenol ethoxylates or APEs have been found to persist in the environment.  “APEs, which include nonylphenol ethoxylates and octylphenol ethoxylates, are surfactants, or "surface active agents" that are key to detergents' effectiveness. They are added to some laundry detergents, disinfectants, laundry stain removers, and citrus cleaner/degreasers. When discharged in municipal waste water, nonylphenol ethoxylates and octylphenol ethoxylates break down into nonylphenol and octylphenol, which are more toxic and do not readily biodegrade in soil and water. APEs have been shown to mimic the hormone estrogen, and their presence in water may be harming the reproduction and survival of salmon and other fish. For example, in Britain, researcher John Sumpter discovered that male fish exposed to APEs in rivers were producing female egg-yolk proteins. APE pollution may be threatening fish in the U.S. as well, for octylphenol and nonylphenol were the detergent metabolites that the USGS detected in 69% of streams tested…Such ubiquity may not bode well for humans, either: the APE p-nonylphenol has also caused estrogen-sensitive breast cancer cells to proliferate in test tubes” (3).  And then there are phosphates.  Phosphates are commonly used in cleaning products and detergents.  Phosphates are naturally occurring mineral compounds and are mined from the earth.  They are also in our bodies and are considered “nutrients…essential to human, animal and plant life” (4).  Unfortunately not unlike the way we have misused and overused other naturally occurring earthly resources, the prolific use of phosphates has some terrible consequences for our environment.  Phosphates in cleaning products are one source (although arguably small compared with farm run off) contributing to algae blooms, which kill water life and significantly degrade water quality. And “municipal sewage facilities not practicing phosphate removal can be a significant source of phosphates entering the environment.”(5).

One of the biggest differences between people today using all these products and the people of my grandmother’s mother’s generation is the amount of chemicals in our bodies. Greenpeace states “Everybody now carries as many as 300 industrial chemicals in their bodies that their great grandparents would not have had in theirs” (6).  Other sources show, “Scientists estimate that everyone alive today carries within her or his body at least 700 contaminants, most of which have not been well studied (Onstot and others).  This is true whether we live in a rural or isolated area, in the middle of a large city, or near an industrialized area. Because many chemicals have the ability to attach to dust particles and/or catch air and water currents and travel far from where they are produced or used, the globe is bathed in a chemical soup. Our bodies have no alternative but to absorb these chemicals and sometimes store them for long periods of time. Whether we live in Samoa or San Diego, Juneau, or Johannesburg, all our bodies are receptacles for a multitude of industrial chemicals. Wherever we live, we all live in a chemically contaminated neighbourhood” (7).  So what impact is this having on health? 

Chemicals in cleaning products have been linked with allergies, including asthma and eczema, cancer, kidney, liver, and lung damage and many other damaging health effects.  Here are just a few examples from the Environmental Health Association of Nova Scotia of common household cleaning products what they can do to us:

“Aerosol products- Aerosol propellants may contain propane, formaldehyde, a carcinogen, neurotoxin and central nervous system depressant, methylene chloride, a carcinogen, neurotoxin and reproductive toxin, and nitrous oxide . Products applied with aerosol sprays are broken into minute particles, which can be more deeply inhaled than larger particles, which may increase their toxic effect.
Ammonia - Undiluted, ammonia is a severe eye and respiratory irritant that can cause severe burning pain, and corrosive damage including chemical burns, cataracts and corneal damage.  It can also cause kidney and liver damage. Repeated or prolonged exposure to vapours can result in bronchitis and pneumonia.  Found in a wide range of cleaning products.  Ammonia will react with bleach to form poisonous chlorine gas that can cause burning and watering of eyes, as well as burning of the nose and mouth.
Sodium hypochlorite (bleach) - A corrosive chemical, sodium hypochlorite is an eye, skin and respiratory irritant, as well as a sensitizer.  It is especially hazardous to people with heart conditions or asthma, and can be fatal if swallowed.  It may be a neurotoxin and toxic to the liver.  Found in a wide range of household cleaners.
Sodium Lauryl Sulfate  - Sodium lauryl sulfate (SLS) is used as a lathering agent.  This chemical is a known skin irritant. It also enhances the allergic response to other toxins and allergens. The U.S. government has warned manufacturers of unacceptable levels of dioxin formation in some products containing this ingredient.  SLS can react with other ingredients to form cancer-causing nitrosamines.” (8)

Chemical cleaning products have also been linked to asthma and other allergies.  “Research has already proven that a young child's risk of acquiring asthma increases if their early life lacks viruses, bacteria and endotoxins (pathogen products)… This research, contained in the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC) of the University of Bristol of the United Kingdom, takes this theory one step further by suggesting that it is not merely the lack of bacteria and their products that lead to asthma and allergies, but in fact, the chemicals within household cleaning products.”   So its both the lack of natural bacteria’s etc from children environments due to the use of chemical cleaning products and the chemicals themselves that are causing allergies.  Commercial cleaning staff are also over-represented when it comes to allergies, especially asthma.

Once again this issue for me is about weighing up risk.  I don’t want to argue about it, I want to change the way we live and reduce the risk of health problems and our impact on the environment.  The great thing is that there are simple alternatives to most of these chemicals.  Women have used white vinegar for centuries for cleaning.  As well as vinegar things like baking soda, lemon juice, soap nuts and essential oils.  And you can re-use old spray bottles and other containers, which is also helping to reduce waste!!!  I have stopped using washing powder and I am currently experimenting with soap nuts.  They are definitely soapy but have no scent and don’t really clean badly soiled or smelly items.  So I’ve ordered some lavender essential oil to add to the wash cycle which is both antibacterial and has a nice smell.  You just add a few drops to the wash.  I soak cleaning cloth’s and tea towels and any other really soiled or smelly things in white vinegar and water for a few hours before washing.  Vinegar is also great as a general spray and wipe for kitchens, all surfaces including stainless steel.  You can add a couple of teaspoons of baking soda and some lemon juice to this and/or eucalyptus or lavender essential oil.  Vinegar is also great in the bathroom.  If you pour a cup into the toilet and leave it to soak overnight it whitens the bowl and you can use the same spray as the kitchen one for the rest of the toilet, basins and shower box etc.  A vinegar spray is awesome for mirrors I haven’t tried it on windows yet but the mirrors came our beautiful and streak free.  And I use the same spray to spray my polished wooden floors, which I then mop and they come out great too.  It’s so awesome not having to have a different product for every job!

Greenpeace has a page on their website dedicated to “Greener Cleaning” http://www.greenpeace.org/new-zealand/en/take-action/green-your-life/greener-cleaning/ which has some awesome recipes and suggestions for natural cleaning products!  I will be trying them out over the coming weeks.  Especially the ‘pure soap’ (just like grandma used to use), I have to do some more research, as I’m not sure what constitutes ‘pure’.  I have read that ‘sunlight soap’ fits into this category so ill check it out.

So my small green steps for this week are…

1)      Ban the chemical cleaners!

2)      Find out about ‘pure soap’ and get some to try.

3)      Continue experimenting with recipes and natural ingredients for household cleaning products.

4)      Stock up on natural alternatives including lemons, baking soda and vinegar and some essential oils.

 References

(1)   http://www.soapnuts.co.nz/Soapnuts/How-to-use-SoapNuts.html

(2)   http://www.mfe.govt.nz/issues/sustainable-industry/govt3/topic-areas/office-consumables/soap-cleaning.html

(3)   http://www.organicconsumers.org/articles/article_279.cfm

(4)   http://www.phosphatesfacts.org/faqs.asp

(5)   http://www.phosphatesfacts.org/faqs.asp

(6)   http://www.greenpeace.org.uk/media/press-releases/greenpeace-to-vacuum-100-homes-across-britain

(7)   http://www.chemicalbodyburden.org/whatisbb.htm

(8)   http://www.lesstoxicguide.ca/index.asp?fetch=household

(9) http://www.naturalnews.com/024429_chemicals_asthma_products.html#ixzz1Wb4xAYcv

The first 'Little Green Step', week one, personal care products.

 

"We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children."  ~Native American Proverb

Personal care products are part of our everyday life.  The average American woman uses 12 personal care items a day, American men 6.  Shampoo, conditioner, deodorant, perfume, cleanser, moisturiser, soap or body wash, make-up products, foundation, lipstick the list goes on.  Not to mention what we do to ourselves in the name of beauty at the hair salon, hair dye, chemical straightners, perming solution, styling products, you only have to get a whiff of half of it to realize its probably not that good for us!  And seriously what are all those ingredients??  I watched ‘The Story of Cosmetics’ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pfq000AF1i8 and was pretty shocked by the idea that we use all these products and we don’t really know what those ingredients are or what they are doing to the environment and us.  Something that is known is that some of those chemicals are carcinogens.  What’s a carcinogen?  Well its  “a substance or agent that causes cancer” (1). In Toxic Beauty: How Cosmetics and Personal Care Products Endanger Your Health,  Samuel S. Epstein, Randall Fitzgerald, describe our skin as being “the body’s largest organ” (2).  They go on to say that “Conventional cosmetics and personal-care products contain many frank and hidden carcinogens making them the most important and still unrecognised class of avoidable carcinogen exposure for the overwhelming majority of consumers in major industrialized nations”  (3). So essentially what we are doing is applying layers of carcinogenic or cancer causing chemicals to our body’s biggest organ, multiple times a day???  Huh??? 

As for the environmental impacts, chemicals from personal care products are showing up in our waterways as well as other chemicals we produce.  “Along with pharmaceuticals, personal care products also are showing up in water. Generally these chemicals are the active ingredients or preservatives in cosmetics, toiletries or fragrances. For example, nitro musks, used as a fragrance in many cosmetics, detergents, toiletries and other personal care products, have attracted concern because of their persistence and possible adverse environmental impacts. Some countries have taken action to ban nitro musks. Also, sun screen agents have been detected in lakes and fish” (4).  They are still trying to produce conclusive studies about the effects that this will have but it seems only logical to me that dumping synthetic chemicals into the ecosystem must have some impact on the delicate ecological balance. 

There will no doubt be endless debate about this issue.   I’m sure there is big money in personal care products and we live in a world where often our health and the health of our environment come second place to economics!  The simple facts are that we are exposing ourselves to a range of chemicals that ‘potentially’ could be causing us cancer and they are ending up in our environment, we know that much.  But we don’t know conclusively because not enough research has been done so….Russian roulette anyone??  Seriously would you give your child a drink if someone said, “this may cause cancer but we can’t be sure”.  I don’t think so.  Sadly we are kind of guinea pigs and we assume certain things when we go shopping, like that what we get off the shelf is safe to consume!

I decided I wanted to stop the madness and stop using this stuff so I had to check out what the alternatives were.  At the supermarket we are lucky enough to have lots of options but considering we are on such a tight budget its does comes down to dollars and cents.  The budget, petro-chemical options of course are the cheapest making the environmentally friendly chemical free varieties feel out of reach by comparison.  And so around and around I went weighing up the options and in the end always giving in to the least desirable and cheapest option.  And ahhhhh the frustration!! 

So I thought I would make my own.  I checked out the net and found lots of home-made recipes for stuff like lemon and cucumber shampoo for example and a honey and sugar mixture for exfoliating my face (mmmm sounds delicious).  I was however a bit short of fresh ingredients this day so I used 2 cups of warm water, 2 tblspns baking soda and the juice of one lemon for a hair rinse that left my hair ‘squeaky clean’!  I have found two ‘miracle’ products…vinegar and soapnuts.  Vinegar is great for all kinds of health and beauty solutions.  I have used apple cider vinegar as a conditioning rinse for my hair as it is said to “neutralize the alkali left by shampoos and give hair extra shine”.  Add 2 tblspns olive oil and 3 egg whites to 1 tsp of apple cider vinegar for an intensive hair conditioner.  White distilled vinegar wiped under your arms is a natural deodorant.  My husband is not so keen on the smell of vinegar though I may have to find some other options.  I have a book called vinegar: 1001 practical household uses, needless to say I’ve stocked up!!  There lots of other uses aside from health and beauty such as laundry, cleaning etc hence the miracle product status!  The other miracle product (which I have yet to try cause its still coming in the mail) but it sounds fantastic is Soapnuts!  “As a 100% natural, environment friendly, bio degradable, economical & effective alternative, SoapNuts can easily replace your "normal" detergent.” (5).  Not only can you replace you dishwashing liquid, clothes washing powder, window cleaner, and general household cleaners with soapnuts you can replace your shampoo, liquid soap and body wash with these as well!!!  They are cheaper, chemical free and biodegradable!!!

So some small green steps for this week…

1)                  Replace shampoo and conditioner with natural home-made alternatives

2)                  Replace body wash and soap with natural, chemical free alternatives 

3)                  Start to compile a natural ‘recipe’ book of ideas for personal care products

4)                  Experiment!! Yay!!  Its actually fun breaking free the dependence on chemical products, it feels great.

5)                  Hair dye free…might try alternatives at a later stage.

References

(1)   http://www.medterms.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=2625)

(2)   http://books.google.co.nz/books?hl=en&lr=&id=-h8m7WSltK0C&oi=fnd&pg=PR9&dq=carcinogens+in+personal+car+products&ots=sjFidTI21A&sig=dj2EjWTtQ27ZbV0IFIgfdU7JowI#v=onepage&q&f=false  (p.23)

(3)   Ibid (p.24)

(4)   http://ag.arizona.edu/azwater/awr/july00/feature1.htm

(5)   http://www.soapnuts.co.nz/