from Natural Life Magazine, November/December 2007
From the Editor’s Desk 
When Governments Greenwash
Consumers appear to be wary of companies who label their products as being “green,” says a recent Ipsos Reid study conducted this Spring on behalf of Icynene, a spray foam insulation brand. Between 60 and 70 percent of North Americans either “strongly” or “somewhat” agree that calling a product “green” is usually just a marketing tactic.
I think there is a message to governments in this finding that a significant percentage of people view green labeling as little more than a marketing tactic. In this hyper-frenzied era of greenupmanship, political leaders everywhere have jumped onto the green bandwagon, sensing they would experience death at the polls if they didn’t.
And so we have George W. Bush’s Clear Skies Act and its carbon intensity-based “fix” for global warming. Sounds green, except that measuring the ratio of carbon emissions to economic activity doesn’t actually reduce carbon emissions. According to the Earth Policy Institute, from 1990 to 2000 the carbon intensity of the American economy declined by 17 percent, yet total emissions increased by 14 percent. Of course, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper has eagerly followed Bush in championing this sham so he doesn’t have to upset his Alberta oil tar sands buddies with real caps on emissions.
But he has taken the greenwash act much further, proclaiming himself the greenest of them all and vowing his government is concerned about climate change, even though he has actually come out on the denial side of the issue in the past. Awhile back, at an international climate change meeting, he even had the audacity to suggest that the world should follow Canada’s wonderful example. Maybe we were supposed to be so blinded by that dazzling presentation we wouldn’t notice as he slashed spending on various environmental programs and ignored his government's Kyoto commitments.
For instance, this fall, he virtually gutted the Environment Canada’s Ecological Monitoring and Assessment Network. EMAN is a partnership of over 600 organizations and individuals who undertake ecological monitoring with the help of a volunteer network of “citizen scientists” – schools, community groups, individuals, naturalists, backyard enthusiasts, Scouts and Guides – who collect information about things like soil, air, water, wildflowers, frogs, ice and worms, which is then analyzed by scientists in order to track the influence of climate change. The cuts were reportedly due to budget problems. Trouble is, around the same time, the government announced a budget surplus of $15 billion and hinted at tax cuts. I am betting that the thousands of community volunteers involved with the programs coordinated by EMAN will smell something foul here...and that they won’t take this scandalous blow to climate change monitoring lying down.
Politicians should be wary of painting themselves green while ignoring the real issues and cutting environment programs behind the public’s back. We know green when we see it. And, according to that Ipsos Reid poll, we recognize greenwash when we smell it.
Wendy Priesnitz, Editor
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