The Futurology Exchange by Okanagan Life Magazine

Manufactured Landscapes

I may be late to the game, but I recently watched the documentary Manufactured Landscapes. WOW! This was the first time I had seen the work of Canadian photographer Edward Burtynsky. Watching this film, I really came to realize that I never fully understood the sheer vastness, the enormous scale of the resource extraction and manufacturing that we all rely on for our daily existence and the impacts these activities have on our environment and other human lives. We might live in the beautiful Okanagan, but we all contribute to the creation of these man-made landscapes with how we live and what we buy. It's a small world, and as modern humans we are creating large scars upon it. Seeing is believing. I highly recommend watching this film. I've posted the opening shot of the film below. Also visit Burtynsky's website for galleries of his stunning, and sometimes shocking work.

The Future of the Okanagan: A Round Table Discussion Worth Responding To

Compelling conversations don't get much better than this one (available as a text transcript or audio recording), held at the Rotary Centre for the Arts this past November. Okanagan Life Magazine invited some of the Okanagan's best minds and important players to sit down and talk about the Valley's future, as well as options for its sustainability. What we heard at this discussion left us determined to learn more about the issues and with a new mandate to help get the Okanagan's residents involved and participating in a broad exchange of ideas.

Listening to this discussion, it becomes very clear that our shared future is being shaped right now, and if we all go along with the status quo, we may be in for a great deal of unpleasant consequences. Now is not the time to be apathetic.

Hear what a development manager, a wine industry consultant, an organic farmer, an aquatic biologist, a technology expert, a registered architect, a business consultant to First Nations, and three UBC-O professors (from the schools of economics, engineering and sociology) have to say on issues such as the impacts of global factors on the Okanagan, growth and development questions, and the impacts that absentee homeowners have on our communities.

This blog has been set up to share news, views, reviews and interviews on the subject of the Okanagan's future and it's sustainability. I encourage everyone to make comments on anything we post here, beginning with your thoughts and reactions to this round table discussion. Don't leave the important ideas and debates to back room meetings. Get involved and voice your opinions so that our leaders cannot ignore you.

Stuff: 101

Here's a fast, entertaining primer on the lifecycle and impacts of the products we all consume. The Story of Stuff is a website with a 20-minute enhanced video that breaks down the complexities of our modern system of production and consumption into a message that is very easy to understand. It's focus in on the United States, but it applies equally to Canada. Look around at all the stuff you have after you watch this and it will become apparent very quickly just how much one person's impact can be.

Ban the Bags

CBC news reported today (www.cbc.ca/consumer/story/2008/01/08/china-bags.html) that China has announced a ban on the ubiquitous plastic shopping bag. Beginning on June 1, "Firms that continue to sell, make and distribute bags thicker than 0.025 mm thick will be given fines and authorities may seize goods and profits..."

Cradle to Cradle Design: An Idea Whose Time Has Come

William McDonough, co-author of Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things, gives a humourous presentation about the need for, and very real capabilities of, designing the products we consume to be fully sustainable and ecologically-friendly — without ending up in a landfill or a "slow motion waste" recycling stream in which the material recycled cannot be used to re-create a product of the same quality as the original.

McDonough also presents plans for an entire sustainable city to be built in China (yes — China!). It's an amazing concept, and should it be pulled off, will give the rest of the world a great template to build on or use as inspiration.

This presentation offers some reasons to remain optimistic about the possibilities for our future. Wouldn't it be great if the Okanagan's new economy could be built with companies and practices with these ideas at their core?

I must give credit to Ethan Andrews, my good friend from Denver, Colorado for passing McDonough's book on to me as a gift. Ethan does some amazing work in the way of environmental art and design with his company Leap Year.