by Maceo Carrillo Martinet
Daily Lobo columnist
The new face of environmentalism is General Motors - or maybe the Pentagon.
You might have noticed the worst abusers of the planet are often running the most prominent campaigns promoting environmentalism, ignoring the major contributions of individuals concerned for the Earth and its occupants.
Even the United States military, one of world's worst polluters, is joining in on the festivities. The military has distributed glossy posters showing military personnel standing in grasslands with the Earth behind like a halo. The military's catchphrase is "Sustaining the environment for a secure future."
The Department of Defense has a peculiar way of sustaining the environment considering it sought immunity from almost all environmental protection laws, such as the Clean Air Act, Superfund Act and the Endangered Species Act.
Friday was the 35th anniversary of Earth Day. Amazingly, most of the larger events commemorating this day are organized by big business, including the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers. The alliance used the occasion to announce the beginning of a national campaign that will show how much cleaner smog emissions are compared with 35 years ago.
Pollution controls on automobile emissions might be better than they were in the 1970s, but there are many areas that have not improved.
The waste we generate is a clear example of how destructive our lifestyles are. In 1970, the solid waste generated every day per person was 3.3 pounds. Today this average is expected to be 4.4 pounds.
Our recycling rates are horrendously low and have actually been decreasing over the years. About 50 billion aluminum soda and beer cans are added to the nation's dumps and landfills every year.
Unfortunately, we do not learn the stories of the real heroic leaders that walk among us.
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There is Wangari Maathai, a Kenyan woman who recently won the Nobel Peace Prize for her work with the Green Belt Movement. This movement started 30 years ago with a group of women planting seven trees. Today more than 30 million trees have been planted across the country with the help of this organization.
One of the most important lessons Wangari says she has learned is that citizens need to be empowered and need to feel the life we want for our children can only come about through protecting and restoring the earth.
There is Kaisha Atakhanova, a biologist trying to clean up her native country, Kazakhstan, which is contaminated with 237 million tons of nuclear waste from the Soviet era. Kaisha, studying the genetic impacts from radiation exposure, realized she wanted her work to help her community, not only herself.
There is Corneille Ewango, a botanist from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, who risked his life to protect 3 million acres of forest during a civil war.
There is Chavannes Jean-Baptiste, an agronomist who discovered his own way to educate and train tens of thousands of Haitians farmers to use water-saving techniques, erosion prevention methods and ways to organically replenish the soil.
The secret to his efforts, Chavannes said, is to learn how to eliminate the divisions separating people and to create solidarity.
Then there is Isidro Baldenegro Lopez, who brought world attention to the atrocities done to the indigenous Tarahumara people living in Mexico's Sierra Madre Mountains by logging companies and drug traffickers. Lopez's father was killed for doing the same work he is doing today.
If you're looking for a role model for conservation and sustainability, search out environmental leaders such as these, not corporations or government institutions touting claims that they pollute less now than they did before.
