Boycott Tesco's

I have always been slighty dubious about Tesco's practices but in the last two weeks their practices have enraged me. Firstly the article published by the BBC http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/north_yorkshire/8411894.stm, which reported on a line of christmas cards sold by Tesco's, which can only be described as racist. I myself have red hair and was extremely offended.

Secondly, and the issue that I am most personally aggrieved over the closure of a local bar in their continued aggressive dominance of British retail. The Quay bar has long been established in Leicester and I was a regular in my student days. Recently in the last month a church put an event on in the bar and a week later were planning another event to encourage community cohesion in surrounding area until they turned up on the night (22nd Dec) to find it closed. The event had been discussed with management but no-one had mention or seemed aware of Tesco's intentions to gut the popular venue. The refit was planned over the Christmas period whilst the students and local residents were away so that no one can protest against Tesco's plans, a convenient coincidence perhaps?

However what is most ridiculous is the location, the Quay is a small venue, surely only large enough for a small Tesco Metro and is only 10 metres away from a small Sainsbury's and within three minutes walk of a large independant off-license, a Spar and the student union shop. With a large Morrisons supermarket and a countless small shops situated within a 10 minute walk.

Why, Tesco's, is no part of Britain allowed to be untouched by your greedy desire? I'm fed up with seeing your corporate and bland Tesco branding everywhere, its sickening. Please also spare a thought for the wonderful bar staff formally at the Quay that where made redundant at Chrsitmas. Nice touch Tesco's.

Cradle to Cradle

An approach suggested by the authors of this book Cradle to Cradle - remaking the way we make things by William McDonough & Michael Braungart. This book is very interesting if a first a bit depressing you get over the state of the world and start to thing possibilities. It basically describes the way (nature American book) the environment manages resources. They call this approach cradle to cradle to express how resources and nutrients are continually recycled endlessly without any loss in quality and to the continued benefit of the ecosystems around them. They describe the human model as cradle to grave, we extract resources and use the resource them bury it in landfill where it cannot be reused or reclaimed. If we recycle, which we rarely do we don't take the time to seperate the materials or cannot because they weren't designed to be seperated. So the materials are recycled into lower quality forms of themselves because of contaimination with other materials. Thus making the recycled material unsatisfactory for use again in the initial product and so what they call downcycling to a lower quality product i.e. a water bottle becomes a speed hump or flower pot.

They suggest that current attempts therefore are not sufficient they are less bad but still ultimately no good because the resources are lost to landfill eventually and more resources then need to be extracted. they propose that poroducts should be designed in such a way that materials can be continually reclaimed at the end of life and reused for the same purpose. Negating the need to extract new materials from the earth and continually cycling those already in use with zero waste.

Its very interesting but in order to be fully realised needs a complete change in the way society and industry things and works. However it has inspired some companies to follow their advice and produce products that enable cradle to cradle lifecycles.

The problem though is one of logistics how can we ensure that these products are reused in the way the company intends. I can't speak for America but the recycling capability in Leicester a large british city is largely out dated, even though Leicester was britians first environmental city? Yes we have different waste collections but for only two types of plastic, paper, glass and I know the metal items are removed magnetically from the other rubbish. But what about the other 7 types of packaging plastic, what about cardboard, and what about plastic consumer goods at the end of life if I take them to the tip they all just go in one big skip labelled electrical.

The recycling infrastructure really needs an overhaul otherwise all the Sustainable Design going on is going to waste.

Your thoughts as usual please.....