Do the products you buy damage the environment?

So of all the smartphones and mobile phones being made, which ones do you suggest we buy? What is the most environmentally friendly phone available to us today? What is the most popular make you guys at Friends of the Earth use? Many thanks.

Interesting programme about copper mining in Zambia on the other night. Same story. Pollution, exploitation and corruption but where are the consumer products that don’t damage the environment? I sometimes think FoE would have us go back to being hunter-gathers.

The big trouble with this entire debate is that all these negative environmental issues have to fight for space with other things that occupy our waking hours. We are concerned (among other things) with what our relatives and friends are doing, what our children are up to in school, what the pay cheque (if there is one) will cover this month, how on earth we can fit in two dozen different engagements into the time available, what the next grocery shop will be, transport to and from everything and, of course communication by mobile phone. Specifically, the mobile is now a part of everyday life. The genie is out of the bottle, try stuffing it back in.

To deal effectively with issues like inappropriate tin mining, poor labour practices and the destruction of the environment, requires a sea change in the way we live. This might be forced upon us by circumstances for which we only have ourselves to blame, but I don’t see the government being able to change our appetite for the products that make our life comfortable, convenient and aspirational. I also don’t see manufacturers putting themselves out of business because they use too many natural resources to supply our demands. I applaud the efforts of organisations like Friends Of The Earth to tackle manufacturers directly. Wiil they be seen as thorns in the flesh or catalists for change? Will China or India clean up their industry or will they continue to point to the hypocritical West?

Through out history we have been driven (in the ‘developed’ countries) by the need to improve the standard of living. The industrial revolution was hailed as a new dawn. Looking back it was also brutal and ugly, but the Victorians didn’t see it like that. We strive for bigger and better in almost every area of our lives. Perhaps we are coming to a stage where we have reached a peak and we are going backwards. Concord no longer flies, movement round the U.K. is slower, hospitals breed diseases instead of curing them, high streets are collapsing, energy is getting more problematic and flooding and droughts are getting more commonplace. So, maybe, one solution to environmental polution will be an evolutionary one. Education will play a part for those who are prepared to be educated, but this won’t be universal by any means. Those thinkers, who care,(and are able to) will adapt their lives to be as protective as they can for the planet but I fear they are a minority of the live now pay later population.

I wonder how many will realise that it is possible to choose one two or three answers in the poll associated with this Conversation.

Having set many online tests for students, I’m familiar with the convention that circles show that one answer is allowed and that squares indicate that two or more are permitted. I doubt that most users will be aware of this.

In earlier polls of this type it has been clear that more than one answer can be chosen, but this one has slipped through.

It won’t happen in a market that is profit-driven. It has been no different over the centuries, so why shoould you expect it to change now? Most people just want more “things” assuming that means a higher living standard, and don’t think about the wider issues. You need a more realistic strategy if you are going to change behaviour – one that might work, not one that tries to pander to our better nature.
Recycling products, repairing products, making longer-lasting products could avoid their continual replacement. But this would inevitably add to costs, reduce sales (and therefore affect the consumer and manufacturing economy). We also have the “new features” upgrade syndrome – need the latest (I wonder why the last “latest” suddenly becomes not good enough?).
It isn’t about making us aware of the environmental impact, it’s about the way the consumer society operates. That’s you and me. Disrupting that would be akin to the banking crisis. What I am saying is that whilst there may be the best of intentions the issue is far more complex than it seems.

It may make us less wasteful if manufacturers had to give significantly longer guarantees – as the car makers have gradually introduced. Not separate insurances, but funded by the maker. This may encourage them to make more reliable longer-lasting products, or to introduce repair schemes.

Coincidentally, I had to purchase a new roll of solder the other day and was shocked at how much it has risen since I last purchased a roll (probably more than 10 years ago). A 500g roll of leaded solder is around £12 and lead-free solder (quite useless IMO) around £16. In future I will start using plastic push-fit plumbing – but I suppose that destroys something else!

I remember the sad demise of tin toothpaste tubes which let you roll up the tube as it was used and squeeze every molecule of toothpaste out.

Is there a call for the tin mines to reopen in Cornwall?

Good to see environmental and ethical aspects of consumer products being discussed in Which? I’d like to see the Consumers’ Association supply information for all reviewed products:
(a) where it is made;
(b) particular environmenatal costs associated with particular types of product (if any);
(c) the parent company that makes it;
(d) some ethical index value of that company by an ethical investment expert.

Subscribers who don’t care about the environment, the exploitation of near-slave labour or corruption could ignore the ratings, but they would be very useful for those that cared, as this info is difficult to mine and would add great value.