LiveGreen Blog

Sunday, April 20, 2008

San Diego EarthFair 2008 - Worst Earth Fair EVER!

Just a quick comment about this EarthFair.

Our booth was sandwiched between WALMART and CLOROX.I had always heard of small businesses being shut down by a Walmart moving into town, but this was the first time I'd felt the effects.

If you thought it couldn't get any worse, the food vendors used styrofoam and plastic bags were being handed out by the City of San Diego. This by a fair that claims to be zero-waste.

4 Comments:

K said...

Chin up...can't change the system without changing the culture!

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/20/magazine/20wwln-lede-t.html?_r=1&ref=world&pagewanted=all&oref=slogin

Michael Pollan eloquently argues how we can get people, one at a time, to bother...

April 21, 2008 6:07 PM

Victoria said...

Came across a new source to think locally about shopping called Locallectual.

www.locallectual.com

We need to stay local.

April 25, 2008 3:46 AM

Anonymous said...

I investigated this issue and here are the results...

'Just a beef to pick with who it may concern,
Food vendors used styrofoam and plastic bags were handed out by theCity of San Diago. Do you claim to be a zero-waste fair? Please respond
Carmen

The Response...
'Hi Carmen, The Balboa Park food vendor is free to use whatever packaging theychoose. We have no control over this. Although they followed ourguidelines in 2006 and 2007, it appears they did not do so this year. Note that OUR food vendors - located on the grass at Park & Presidents -are REQUIRED to use compostable food service items, and in fact wecollect these items with the food waste and have it composted by thecity instead of being sent to a landfill. There were a few minorviolations (e.g., one vendor had those little plastic packets of soysauce instead of having bulk dispensers) but by and large they usedcompostable or recyclable food service items. I don't know about the plastic bags being handed out by the City. Ifthere were cheap and disposable... well, some people who should knowbetter just don't get it. I do know that at least 3 exhibitors weregiving away, or selling for a dollar or two, REUSABLE shopping bags. Ithink some of these were plastic, but I do draw a distinction betweenreusable plastic items and those that are just trash. Our whole use ofdisposable plastic - the "plastic plague" - is a serious problem, buthasn't made it into the public consciousness yet. We don't claim to be a zero-waste event. We are TRYING to become azero-waste event. It's tough to do. Zero Waste San Diego spent the daydumping the trash containers and separating out the recyclablematerials. I don't have the recapture figures back from the CityEnvironmental Services Department (who does ourwaste/recycling/composting), but the best we've been able to do over thepast few years is about 70% diversion rate. Due to budegetary constraints (i.e., the City is broke), it looks likeEnvironmental Services won't be able to provide services next year. Sowe face the challenge of how to continue to make progress on ourzero-waste goal without their extensive support. We'll see if some ofthe private waste companies (e.g., EDCO or Waste Management) are willingto step up to the challenge.'
Chris KleinEarthFair Production Manager

May 8, 2008 3:18 PM

Michael said...

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June 24, 2008 11:31 AM