Feeding our minds to do the future#sosteniamoci! (italian for “let’s sustain ourserves!”) is an educational program for kids and adults which aim is to let everyone understand the complexity and intertwines of our modern world, without feeling hopeless about it. Even better: by understanding how major global issues (such as the sustainable management of our energy, wastes and natural resources) affect our daily lives AND how our usual behaviours can correct or worsen these issues, we feel empowered to take corrective actions. That’s the goal of the project, which can be summarized by the motto: “to know is to understand that we can”. It is only through a better knowledge of our modern system that we may understand how connected are our individual lives to global issues, and realize that every action we take really matters, and that, yes, we can indeed make a difference. Willing or not, we have always made it.
Sustainability is defined as durability, the ability to last through time: sustainable is therefore something that can continue. Right from this definition we understand how important is that we deal with sustainability: at stake is the very ability of our species to last on this planet. Why are we on a path of non-durability then? The reason is found at the heart of the productivist paradigm developed from the industrial revolution on, which tends to neglect the environmental and social consequences of an indiscriminate exploitation of natural resources. Since the mid-800’ a new mindset emerged, which sees humans so powerful and advanced as to be considered an independent entity from planet Earth and the rest of the biosphere. This “dissociation” is at the root of major environmental, social and economic problems we face today.
As the complexity of human society increased through time, mainly thanks to technological and scientific developments, we have seen improvements in life quality of ever more (but not all) people on the planet. On the other hand though, sustainability issues have become increasingly evident and urgent to solve: we basically live in a system that extracts and transforms natural resources (which are finite by definition) at an ever increasing pace, using increasing amount of energy coming mostly from non-renewable sources and, in the process of doing this, we are polluting our soil, our water reserves and even our atmosphere. We have ultimately reached the point where we are changing the benign climate that, during the latter 10,000 years, has allowed our species to thrive. All of this is due to a frantic and artificial need: to endlessly increase the amount of money in circulation. This is an old and well rooted tradition to measure the wellbeing of a community, although with no physical ground and thus impossible to maintain in the long term. By doing so, ironically, we are instead depleting the physical basis of our survivability, one of the most tragic consequences of the wall of dissociation we built between us and the physical planet.
One of the most useful topic to deal with this trend is food. Food is what keeps us alive, providing us both the energy and the material constituents we need. Yet, food comes at the cost of some work to be done in order to produce it, which itself requires energy to be spent and materials to be used. During the process, wastes are produced too. The food production system is therefore a good metaphor of what does not work properly in our modern world. But as we eat every day, three times a day, food also represents one of the most important actions we can take to change and improve our sustainability.
Technological improvements have allowed modern societies to consume larger quantities of meat and animal product than ever before. Moreover, as it has always been associated with the life style of nobles and the rich, meat-eating has become a status symbol of wellbeing, so that as middle classes emerge they tend to shift their diets towards increasing meat consumption. However, as it represents an additional step in the food chain, eating animal products corresponds to 7-10 times greater energy consumption per calorie intake, when compared to a fruit & vegetable based diet. Its impacts are especially evident when the modern food-production system is analysed using a Life-Cycle approach: industrial scale meat production is possible only when animals are fed with massive quantities of grains, which are produced in huge monocultures (often GMO-monocultures). This monocultures are the main responsible of deforestation, with the associated irreversible loss of biodiversity, soil degradation and carbon emissions. In order to be grown and harvested, extensive monocultures require agricultural machines which run on petrol, but also energy-and-water-consuming irrigation systems, synthetic fertilizers and pesticides. The latter two are produced at the expense of great quantities of fossil fuel energy and increase the pollution of soil, water and air. Furthermore, industrial feedlots are responsible for the production of enormous quantities of excrements, ever more filled with hormones and antibiotics required by the industrial system to increase the growth-rate and the resistance of animals forced to live in ever more unnatural conditions. This causes a significant pollution problem, as well as a sanitary emergency as pests evolve to become ever more immune to antibiotics, with the increasing risk of epidemics among animals and humans. As we can see, productive greed is no friend of our environmental, social nor economic sustainability.
But as we know this, we can take action. We can choose what we eat each time we want, with no external constriction. Our conscious decisions can truly make a difference if, by simply shifting our dietary habits towards lower consumption of animal products, we can positively contribute to the solution of huge global problems such as deforestation, biodiversity loss, climate change, energy and water consumption, pollution. We can improve it or keep worsening it, the difference lays in our informed choice.
Wastes is another good example of our consumer-power to make a difference. We have always been told we have to recycle and that is true, as recycling allows to save great amounts of energy, raw materials and water. But recycling should not be our first option. Indeed, the most logical option to solve the waste problem is just to make no waste: reducing the quantity of wastes we produce is more simple than we often think and it even allows us to save money. It’s something we do with our heads as we go shopping, just by paying attention to what we buy. Is it really necessary? Can it be used many times? Once I cannot use it anymore, can it be recycled? These simple questions are at the core of the most efficient strategy for sustainable waste management, the 3R-strategy: first: Reduce; second: Reuse; third: Recycle. The order in which we apply these three actions really matters, as our priority should be not to produce wastes in the first place, therefore reusing what we have many times and, only when this is no longer possible, recycling. As for food, it’s all in our hands and in our heads. Wastes do not exist in nature, humans have created new synthetic materials, but we shall learn how to manage them in a truly circular economy.
As a conclusion we can say that YES, we have lots of big problems today. But it’s not true that we, as individuals, cannot make any difference. We can solve these issues or worsen them. The first step though, is to know they exist, and to understand how they work and how the connect with our daily lives. Only by knowing this all it will be possible for us to engage, individually and collectively, in truly effective actions. And to feel that we can solve all this, we can all live well in a healthy world, and we can do it though time. This is what sustainability is about, and this why it should matter to all of us.
The seminar was addressed at high school students in a 1h30’, whereas at the end of it 30’ were dedicated to question and answer. Contents were presented through a “visual conference” in which the author conveyed them in a simple way through storytelling, whereas a graphic artist was drawing sketches in real time on a screen, by means of a graphic tablet.
Sustainability is defined as durability, the ability to last through time: sustainable is therefore something that can continue. Right from this definition we understand how important is that we deal with sustainability: at stake is the very ability of our species to last on this planet. Why are we on a path of non-durability then? The reason is found at the heart of the productivist paradigm developed from the industrial revolution on, which tends to neglect the environmental and social consequences of an indiscriminate exploitation of natural resources. Since the mid-800’ a new mindset emerged, which sees humans so powerful and advanced as to be considered an independent entity from planet Earth and the rest of the biosphere. This “dissociation” is at the root of major environmental, social and economic problems we face today.
As the complexity of human society increased through time, mainly thanks to technological and scientific developments, we have seen improvements in life quality of ever more (but not all) people on the planet. On the other hand though, sustainability issues have become increasingly evident and urgent to solve: we basically live in a system that extracts and transforms natural resources (which are finite by definition) at an ever increasing pace, using increasing amount of energy coming mostly from non-renewable sources and, in the process of doing this, we are polluting our soil, our water reserves and even our atmosphere. We have ultimately reached the point where we are changing the benign climate that, during the latter 10,000 years, has allowed our species to thrive. All of this is due to a frantic and artificial need: to endlessly increase the amount of money in circulation. This is an old and well rooted tradition to measure the wellbeing of a community, although with no physical ground and thus impossible to maintain in the long term. By doing so, ironically, we are instead depleting the physical basis of our survivability, one of the most tragic consequences of the wall of dissociation we built between us and the physical planet.
One of the most useful topic to deal with this trend is food. Food is what keeps us alive, providing us both the energy and the material constituents we need. Yet, food comes at the cost of some work to be done in order to produce it, which itself requires energy to be spent and materials to be used. During the process, wastes are produced too. The food production system is therefore a good metaphor of what does not work properly in our modern world. But as we eat every day, three times a day, food also represents one of the most important actions we can take to change and improve our sustainability.
Technological improvements have allowed modern societies to consume larger quantities of meat and animal product than ever before. Moreover, as it has always been associated with the life style of nobles and the rich, meat-eating has become a status symbol of wellbeing, so that as middle classes emerge they tend to shift their diets towards increasing meat consumption. However, as it represents an additional step in the food chain, eating animal products corresponds to 7-10 times greater energy consumption per calorie intake, when compared to a fruit & vegetable based diet. Its impacts are especially evident when the modern food-production system is analysed using a Life-Cycle approach: industrial scale meat production is possible only when animals are fed with massive quantities of grains, which are produced in huge monocultures (often GMO-monocultures). This monocultures are the main responsible of deforestation, with the associated irreversible loss of biodiversity, soil degradation and carbon emissions. In order to be grown and harvested, extensive monocultures require agricultural machines which run on petrol, but also energy-and-water-consuming irrigation systems, synthetic fertilizers and pesticides. The latter two are produced at the expense of great quantities of fossil fuel energy and increase the pollution of soil, water and air. Furthermore, industrial feedlots are responsible for the production of enormous quantities of excrements, ever more filled with hormones and antibiotics required by the industrial system to increase the growth-rate and the resistance of animals forced to live in ever more unnatural conditions. This causes a significant pollution problem, as well as a sanitary emergency as pests evolve to become ever more immune to antibiotics, with the increasing risk of epidemics among animals and humans. As we can see, productive greed is no friend of our environmental, social nor economic sustainability.
But as we know this, we can take action. We can choose what we eat each time we want, with no external constriction. Our conscious decisions can truly make a difference if, by simply shifting our dietary habits towards lower consumption of animal products, we can positively contribute to the solution of huge global problems such as deforestation, biodiversity loss, climate change, energy and water consumption, pollution. We can improve it or keep worsening it, the difference lays in our informed choice.
Wastes is another good example of our consumer-power to make a difference. We have always been told we have to recycle and that is true, as recycling allows to save great amounts of energy, raw materials and water. But recycling should not be our first option. Indeed, the most logical option to solve the waste problem is just to make no waste: reducing the quantity of wastes we produce is more simple than we often think and it even allows us to save money. It’s something we do with our heads as we go shopping, just by paying attention to what we buy. Is it really necessary? Can it be used many times? Once I cannot use it anymore, can it be recycled? These simple questions are at the core of the most efficient strategy for sustainable waste management, the 3R-strategy: first: Reduce; second: Reuse; third: Recycle. The order in which we apply these three actions really matters, as our priority should be not to produce wastes in the first place, therefore reusing what we have many times and, only when this is no longer possible, recycling. As for food, it’s all in our hands and in our heads. Wastes do not exist in nature, humans have created new synthetic materials, but we shall learn how to manage them in a truly circular economy.
As a conclusion we can say that YES, we have lots of big problems today. But it’s not true that we, as individuals, cannot make any difference. We can solve these issues or worsen them. The first step though, is to know they exist, and to understand how they work and how the connect with our daily lives. Only by knowing this all it will be possible for us to engage, individually and collectively, in truly effective actions. And to feel that we can solve all this, we can all live well in a healthy world, and we can do it though time. This is what sustainability is about, and this why it should matter to all of us.
The seminar was addressed at high school students in a 1h30’, whereas at the end of it 30’ were dedicated to question and answer. Contents were presented through a “visual conference” in which the author conveyed them in a simple way through storytelling, whereas a graphic artist was drawing sketches in real time on a screen, by means of a graphic tablet.