Source: Sweet Earth Chocolates
I know Fair Trade USA is kind of suspect, but I thought their gift guide might still be useful for folks looking for last-minute Valenine’s Day gifts and somewhat new to the concept of ethical goods. Take a look at it to learn where you can find ethically-sourced roses, chocolate, wine, and clothing, among other things: Fair Trade Certified Valentines Day Gift Guide.
This barrage of chocolate-related posts is me capitalizing on the increased traffic I’m getting because of Valentine’s Day searches. By Tuesday of next week, Crunchy & Chic will go back to it’s regularly scheduled programming. In the meantime, enjoy this post from the San Antonio Current:
Valentine’s Day is the chocolate industry’s holiday season. With an eye toward this February’s annual love-fest, the International Labor Rights Forum purchased an advertising slot on a jumbotron outside the Super Bowl’s Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis on which to broadcast a video called Hershey’s Chocolate, Kissed by Child Labor.
Africa produces 70 percent of the world’s cocoa — much of it with the region’s infamously cheap labor. “In West Africa, where Hershey’s sources much of its cocoa, over 200,000 children are forced to harvest cocoa beans every year,” said Judy Gearhart, executive director of the International Labor Rights Forum, via a press release.
On the day the Super Bowl ad was announced, Hershey’s released a statement detailing steps it would take toward improving labor and sustainability practices, including a $10 million investment in its West African suppliers. That was enough to buy the company a temporary reprieve from the ILRF.
“Hershey’s pledged to take the first step to address rampant forced and child labor in its supply chain,” said Sean Rudolph, ILRF’s campaigns director, “so we decided to pull the ad as a gesture of good faith.”
The scuffle highlights the dark side of a food that, like love, can be bitter or sweet. In addition to labor issues, chocolate plantations can be responsible for deforestation, when growers raze rainforest to plant more cocoa trees.
But chocolate production can also be empowering to farmers and relatively healthy for the environment.
Read more at Hershey’s, West African child labor, and the promise of Brazil’s ‘cabruca’ system – Food – San Antonio Current.
Source: U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon
I’ve been to write about minimalism’s relationship to sustainability, especially for First World people, but I’ve had lots of reading and assignments to do, so that’ll have to wait. For now, check out this piece from Zen Habits about minimalism. Lest Google images fool you, minimalism is not about living in sterile white containers with cube furniture—it’s much more than that:
It’s basically an extension of simplicity — not only do you take things from complex to simple, but you try to get rid of anything that’s unnecessary. All but the essential.
Minimalism says that what’s unnecessary is a luxury, and a waste. Why be wasteful when the unnecessary isn’t needed for happiness? When it just gets in the way of happiness, of peace? By eliminating the unnecessary, we make room for the essential, and give ourselves more breathing space.
Now, exactly what is essential will vary from person to person. So someone might look at my essential things and say “That’s too much — it’s not minimal!” But they’d be wrong — because essential is subjective.
Read more at: On minimalism :zenhabits.
It’s one reaction to First World’s complexity and unsustainability, but it’s not the only way to be sustainable. But I’m sure most readers wouldn’t be hurt by reevaluating whether they need all the things they possess.
National Green Week empowers students to be leaders of their own sustainability campaigns. This year, the largest waste reduction campaign kicks off February 6 – 10, 2012 but you can chose any week from Feb.6- April 22 (Earth Day) to participate. Get your Green Packs and join us today!
Join National Green Week! Registration is free and gives you unlimited access to sustainability education, activities, and more, plus a chance to win the Green in Action Contest.
Source: A House of Straw
I was about to post a link to a German designed office building that’s being praised for being sustainability-minded, but, seeing how it’s basically a spiral of steel, I thought it’s probably not the best example out there. Steel is sustainable in the sense that it’s easily recyclable (and often gets recycled), but the process of mining and refining iron ore into stainless steel has a high impact on the environment.
Instead, I want to introduce you to the idea of straw-bale construction. Building with straw is great because straw is a renewable resource, is already produced as a by-product of cereal farming, and it makes excellent insulation. There are many sources out there explaining how to build homes out of straw—even TLC has an article on How Straw Bale Houses Work. Two sites that come up on Google are A House of Straw and StrawBale.com. Both have instructions and classes on how to build, articles, FAQs, and photos of completed projects. Also check out Straw Bale Construction, which provides a more in-depth analysis of the costs and benefits of using straw for building, among other sustainable building information. View full article »
Sources: The Frog Blog UK, Fooducate
Not that many people know about the child labor and human trafficking that’s involved in chocolate production, or they wouldn’t dare give a box of chocolate as a gift for Valentine’s Day. Seems like my last post has garnered a few hits, but I didn’t explain what slave-free chocolate was, only where you could find it. To start, you can check out The CNN Freedom Project: there’s a section dedicated to slavery in the chocolate industry. I highly recommend the documentary The Dark Side of Chocolate as a primer into cocoa, child trafficking, and what the chocolate industry has (not) been doing. You can get the DVD (and info on how to host a screening) for $6 here. Watch it, show it to your friends and family, and help spread consumer awareness to urge companies to stop using slave labor in their cocoa.
While you’re waiting for the video to come in the mail, here’s a quick rundown of the state of chocolate today:
 | santosh roy on Marine Solar Cells Make The Mo… |
| santosh roy on Marine Solar Cells Make The Mo… |
 | KP on Fair Trade Certified Valentine… |
| Fair Trade Certified… on Everything can be “fair … | |
 | Rahel on What is Minimalism? |
