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No matter how we feel about the EU - Jacques Delors, former chairman of the EU Commission has shown considerable skill in cutting the cackle of false optimism and repression. In 1996, during his talk to the Nordic Council in Copenhagen, he also said: Above all we need to save our natural assets. Right now we are destroying them - either because we do not value them (in the case of air), or because we price them without regard for their scarcity (in the case of water), or for the impacts of their utilisation on natural balances, forests, and energy.
At the same time we are minimising our use of manpower. From 1970 to 1992 the EU achieved an economic growth of 73 percent, in real values; however, over the same interval, occupation increased by a mere 7 percent. Believe me, now is the time for us to adopt a different attitude to how we think of progress, and to think of a new way of measuring our welfare and the impacts of growth on both production methods and lifestyle.
The other side of the coin Somehow material growth has become our curse and delusion. The reverse side of growth is hard to perceive. The benefits of our growth society are abundant and alluring, so we need quite some persuasion to start looking at the other side of the coin: Pesticide pollution of groundwater resources, reduction of the ozone layer, oestrogenic substances in the environment, increased prevalence of allergy and cancer, and impaired sperm quality. J¯rgen H¯jmark Jensen, director of the DK National Food Administration Office, Copenhagen offered the following comment:
The extent of pesticide residues, additives and pathogenic bacteria found in our foodstuffs is higher than ever before. There are a few lights ahead, tiny as they may be. Things are deteriorating all over the place, so somebody must take radical action."A change of attitudes is needed. Obviously, this change of attitudes does not just happen in a jiffy, and in all of us. How come? It’s not as if we lack knowledge, or access to knowledge. We may even convert a spot of land to organic agriculture, meaning that we’ll drop pesticides etc., and actually do so without changing our mindset - since our decision may be based on purely pecuniary deliberations. Now, what does stand in the way of such an attitudinal change?
The attitudes of languagePerhaps, for a start, we could look at the most obvious - what is happening right here and now, while we are writing, and you are reading - that is, language. Words such as "growth promoters" have a nice and positive ring to them. Actually, several years went by before we (the authors) realised that a "growth promoter" is not a valuable proteinised pig-feed, but downright antibiotics. Today the characteristic "spray-tracks" in our fields are tactically referred to as "wheel-tracks". In a similar way we are easily misled to believe that ‘plant protection’ means: trees and shrubs planted by the farmer to shelter his crops, instead of pesticides. So they do work, those words.
By contrast, a word such as "householdwaste" has a negative ring to it. However, assuming a different attitude, organic kitchen waste would mean, high-grade nutrients, only temporarily in the wrong spot, from where they will be taken back to their original environment. Cucumber growers have found that labelling their cucumbers grown with the use of biological pest control will stimulate consumers willingness to buy. The problem being that such cucumbers came from farm units using the so-called integrated production system, allowing the use of pesticides. Another area where things keep going wrong: innovative terms (e.g. the "sustainability" concept coined by the Brundtland Report) become hackneyed and distorted banalities at a disquieting rate. In no time, a "sustainable washing powder" will amount to a washing powder in a handy package with stout handles.
The label of "ecological" is being watered down in a similar way. An example: At a major garden show in 1996 silica gel, a desiccant, was being offered as an "ecological desiccant".
Airy and imprecise expressions
Things went completely off the track when, in 1996, The Danish Farmers’ Association and The Danish Smallholders’ Association presented their blueprint "Landstewardship by The Year 2000". Surely, the paper had been envisaged in some suspense, since presumably it would make the farming sector’s bid for a responsible future production, especially in terms of environmental considerations and food quality. However, the blueprint expressed itself in exceptionally airy and imprecise terms, such as, "to the extent possible", "whenever possible", "endeavour", "within a few years". Peter Esbjerg, professor at the DK agricultural university, madethe following comment, "When it comes to de-concretising the debate, the agricultural sector is a champion. It took years of training to create their prowess in the field."
Cut out the "eco-milk"
Now, how can we learn to make language the vehicle of a different mindset? In the 1995-96 annual progress report published by the DK Ecology Council, Claus Heinberg, member of the council suggested that we simply drop the "eco-milk" concept, and plainly call the product "milk". He also proposed that the term of "pesticide milk" should be adopted, to denote the conventionally produced (agrochemistry-based) milk. As we know already, being literal about product names can have certain consequences. In Denmark we have observed the effect in the case of the so-called "cage-eggs" where sales dropped dramatically, once the DK Co-Op stores started labelling eggs according to mode of production.
So what we need to do is to recapture our language and convert it to "ecological culture". Or more concretely, going for an amendment to Danish marketing legislation, enabling consumers to crack down on marketing malpractice such as misleading and unfair advertising. Or plainly, a conversion of our language, towards making it a concrete and down-to-earth tool, to be used for calling a spade a spade - which in turn would mean: taking another step towards the conversion of our minds.
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