Solutions Part III
Here I go again. This is the last installment for now in my Solutions series. Here is the third popular “solution” that is promoted by big-wigs around the world.
Promote free trade to allow all markets in the world equal opportunity to compete.
This is a nice, fluffy idea. Okay, I won’t be too sarcastic since this is my hope blog, not my sarcasm blog (which will be finished soon). The concern regarding trade is that right now, tariffs and agricultural subsidies in developed nations are making it impossible for the developing nations to have a fair crack at the market. For example, Zimbabwean peaches might be the best in the world, but England gets its peaches from France, because they are subsidised, since both England and France are part of the European Union. I use the EU as an example because they are famous for having the most restrictive trade barriers to the Third World. (No Zimbabwe probably doesn’t export peaches, but what example would you prefer? Widgets?) Anyway, on to the…
Problem: This is one of the many reasons why I keep repeating the point that alternative solutions are important and we need to think outside the box. The whole “free markets are a cure for everything” philosophy continues to blow up in our faces, yet enough people in power still try to implement this “solution.” As soon as poor nations feel they have to sacrifice huge amounts of resources in order to compete successfully with rich nations, the poor nations have already lost. This has been happening for hundreds of years. We have stripped large areas of sub-Saharan Africa dry; destroyed the land; and sucked the life out of its people. This was all in the name of profit, competition, and market control. It is truly sad that we have set such an unsustainable, destructive precedent for others to follow. In order to be like us, they must destroy like us. Hence, China.
Free trade takes away all trade barriers. This includes labour and environmental regulations, it includes any international human rights laws. Child labour and sweatshops are okay. Slash-and-burning rainforests and dumping toxic waste in poor neighbourhoods is groovy. Extracting and using the least environmentally friendly resources is awesome. Why? Because you have to compete! Stay in the game, never let your head down, always be first. Whatever is cheapest is best. And this usually doesn’t include very much long-term planning, because despite the belief that businesses must look out for their long-term interests, the only interests they are really concerned about are those of the shareholders. Give them lots of money to reinvest now; the biggest dividends now.
But what about consumer activism? Surely that has a huge impact on corporations. After all, economics is based on supply and demand. If there’s no demand, the suppliers are out of luck, right? Wrong. Supply and demand is a simplistic way of looking at economics. It’s more like create false demand, and supply that demand. It’s all about advertising, image, and lies. In the late 1970s, there was a massive boycott of Nestlé because they were selling baby formula in Africa, and as a result many infants died from water-borne illnesses and malnutrition (infant formula was diluted with water because the mothers couldn’t afford the amount needed to feed their children). So how did Nestlé change, after this massive global boycott? They didn’t. The boycott continues today, though it has died down quite a bit.
In addition, there’s the new “greenwashing,” which is when corporations put a “sustainability” slant on their image and/or products, without doing anything actually sustainable. For example, Westpac Bank advertises itself as a very sustainable organisation, all the while supporting uranium mining.
Solution: Aaaanyway, finally, the solutions. In order for developing nations to have real equal opportunity to developed nations, they have to have the same amount of global power. Obviously, they do not. As I have explained before, export agriculture is itself a form of colonialism, and it is unnecessary for any nation to feel the need to compete in a global market. Focusing on local production and consumption is the real sustainable option. Poor nations would no longer have to destroy themselves, because they would only be taking what they need, as opposed to what other nations want. If they practiced sustainable agricultural methods, which are inherently part of many traditional agricultural practices already, then they would be able to feed themselves and their close neighbours. Maybe they wouldn’t have a television in every room, or three iPods each, or two SUVs each, but they would have full stomachs and healthy communities.
Perhaps all this hype about “development” is exactly that: hype. We want nations to follow in our footsteps, to give money an inherent value and living things no value at all, to base their entire economies on speculation and group psychology, to live for the purpose of being exploitable labour for someone else who is always more powerful, more wealthy. If we want real solutions, we need to re-evaluate our entire social structure, our entire culture. The rich nations have a huge responsibility: to provide a good example for the poor, since they are following in our footsteps as we speak. Or even better, we could give them the resources they need (that we took away from them) to be self-sufficient and then leave them alone.
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