Living Economies Discussion.

"Basically, what I grasped from the "Living Economies" chapter is that a lot of businesses tend to overlook how their methods of production affect the environment. I agree with Shiva on the point that a lot of corporations are taking what Mother Earth has given to us and selling it to us, which then deprives some of what is naturally ours. Things like water, which is essential to life, corporation take note and capitalize on that by bottling it up and selling it for 1, 2 and sometimes up to 4 dollars for one bottle. Now I personally drink bottled water, but I also am not afraid to take a sip of water from tap. I understand that for an economy to progress we have to make some type of profit, but isn't there a better way to do so that doesn't put so much bad stress on the environment?

Also, when Shiva mentioned how the crops from Native American's and the people of India were taken or their ideas were stolen by Europeans and they made a better profit from them, I felt that was unjust. It's like the term "It's like taking candy from a baby." Yeah, it was probably easy for the European settlers to get the resources they needed, mix that with their technology that they did have, and make the ideas of the Native Americans and Indians better, but they don't even consider the "flip side" of the situation. These people from the tribes and cultures lost something that was more important to them than any money they could have made. There's a quote from the book on the first page (in the introduction) that basically asks how you can put a value on what is in nature for us to use freely. I think that theory can be applies to the Living Economies chapter in the sense that it's basically asking why we put a monetary value on something that should be free for everyone.

I also love how Shiva mentions how a lot of times, people focus more on how the market is doing over how the planet is doing. If our environment is unhealthy, then how would we be able to sell anything? That in turn could mean a slump in the market. That's like someone focusing so much attention on finding ways to produce more apples that they don't realize that the method they are using might have a negative effect on the soil, and even the people who consume it. As a favorite song of mine goes "See I'ma tell you like you told me/Cash rules everything around me."(1) They say money makes the world go 'round, but if there is no world to go 'round, then what purpose does the money serve?"-Sarah Richardson

1. "Sweetest Girl" by Wyclef Jean

Living Economies_Amelia

Chapter 1 Shiva discusses how there is more emphasis in the health of the market than the health well being of people in today’s society. A healthy economy is often measured by economic growth.  From the overexploiting of resources and destroying the ecological processes we have encountered several problems and side effects from the success of corporate globilization.  The success during the industrialization era led to economic and corporate globalization at the expense of the environment and society we live in today.  Greed, profit, and consumerism has led to starvation in some parts of the world and obesity in others.  “An invisible form of killing people by destroying nature,” Claude Alvares describes this as the “Third World War” in which is different from the other world wars but has similar outcomes. Natures economy is suppose to come first, which consist of production of goods and services produced by nature. 

A quarter of the world is starving and 70% of children in the US are obese.  The US spends $240 billion/ year on health costs for obesity.  The globalization of fast food and junk food corporations make it easily accessible to the public for consumption.  According to Amory Lovins and energy expert, the population of the world is about 4 billion but we utilize enough of the earth’s resources as if there were 200 billion.  The US uses 250 times more than the Nigerians.  The reason it’s important to control population is that with each person born in the US, it is equal to using around 50 times the amount of the earths resources compared to the rest of the world.  

Scott Kale Living Economies