SALTING THE EARTH

In ancient times, there existed a ritual of sowing salt into the land of your enemies after their defeat - a kind of curse on their potential for prosperity in the future that made it impossible for crops to grow. Legends describing the origins of this practice can be found amongst the writings of Assyrians, the Old Testament of the Bible, and - perhaps the most famous - tales of the Roman sacking of Carthage in the Third Punic War. Even if only a symbolic plowing, this method of revenge affected one of the most essential natural resources, displaying dominance by destroying the land that nourished its inhabitants physically, emotionally, and socially. Although this practice is ancient, it is crucial to understanding the deeply human flaws present in later devastating destructions - both intentional and unintentional - of the environment in our own times, especially as a result of modern warfare in the 20th and 21st centuries.

WORLD WAR I: 1914-1918

Modern warfare only began to evolve centuries later, and humans started to discover new ways to destroy the Earth and each other. Many of these were tested during World War I, a conflict with over 40 million civilian and military casualties. Aside from the damage and literal upheaval of land incurred through the use of trench warfare, immense amounts of logging also led to deforestation and erosion. More advanced artillery and transportation required ever-increasing amounts of metals and petroleum to be extracted from the Earth. Finally, the use of chemical warfare had horrific human and environmental consequences. The development of chlorine and mustard gas chemicals, along with the constant firing of mortars and bullets, allowed innumerable harmful substances to settle to the ground and seep into soil, groundwater, and runoff - in essence, ‘salting’ it for years to come.

WORLD WAR II: 1939-1945

Although already a practice in WWI, the use of artillery shelling and landmines was even more prevalent in World War II. Their production and subsequent disposal lead to more environmental disasters - some chemicals were even dumped directly into the ocean. But WWII was not like the wars before it, which were fought only on land and sea. This war was also fought in the sky. Cargo aircraft, air-force fighter pilots, and bomber planes destroyed lives and vast swaths of land and city space, requiring large amounts of jet fuel - one of the most environmentally unfriendly agents.

But, of course, the most destructive explosive of WWII was the nuclear bomb. Developed in New Mexico (where some residents are still dealing with the health effects of nuclear testing), the first nuclear weapon was dropped on the city of Hiroshima, instantly killing 70,000 people. It vaporized parts of the city and contaminated the landscape for miles around with radiotoxicity. That day, temperatures within the fireball that devastated Hiroshima reached 7500 degrees Fahrenheit, or 75% as hot as the surface of the sun.

THE VIETNAM WAR AND THE SECRET WAR: 1955-1975

The Vietnam War is remembered for its use of slash-and-burn tactics: specifically, the US military’s use of the carcinogenic dioxin Agent Orange - an herbicide created to kill the dense underbrush that grew in the lush, green country. The military sprayed millions of gallons of Agent Orange throughout the war, which in turn affected millions of people (and continues to affect, for some), causing health problems, even fatalities, and economic hardship associated with medical expenses, along with the emotional stress which accompanies all of these.

In addition, landmines and bombs - such as those which ARTICLE22 and the Mines Advisory Group work to excavate - caused lasting human and environmental damage in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia. In Laos alone, 250 million bombs were dropped - making it the most bombed country ever per capita. 80 million of these bombs failed to detonate and are now considered unexploded ordnance (UXO). UXO continues to kill and injure thousands of Laotians and release hazardous chemicals, some of which render the soil infertile and the water undrinkable.

THE RWANDAN GENOCIDE - 1994

The conflict between the Hutu majority and Tutsi minority of Rwanda lasted only three months, during which time 800,000 people were murdered. This conflict didn’t spring out of nowhere. Ethnic tensions had been stoked for decades, during colonial rule, and the UN's withdrawal from the initial conflict for fear of the impact it might have on European soldiers on the ground did not help matters, inflaming the existing power vacuum. Millions of refugees were forced to flee the conflict — a type of trouble we are sadly not unaccustomed to hearing about in our world today.

A majority of these refugees settled in the Congo. This mass displacement not only had enormous social, political, personal, and emotional effects on the millions of uprooted Rwandans; it also placed stress on ecosystems and required clearing of Congolese forests in order to create space and provide fuel for the massive refugee camps.

This, once more, rings in the echoes of the same colonialism which is at the root of the conflict. A century before, Belgian colonial rule had begun its massively destructive exploitation of Congolese locals and land in order to extract as much as possible from the forests of rubber trees and feed the growing rubber industry - at the cost of countless human lives.

SOURCES

Icrc.org Environment and Warfare

Jstor.org Armed Conflict and the Environment: A Critique of the Literature

Newsecuritybeat.org The Environment Has Become a Hostage of Armed Conflict

Un.org International Day for Preventing the Exploitation of the Environment in War and Armed Conflict

Unep.org Curbing Negative Environmental Impacts of War and Armed Conflict

Unep.org Protecting the Environment During Armed Conflict: An Inventory and Analysis of International Law

One line of the poem begs the reader: “Take up our quarrel with the foe:/ To you from failing hands we throw/ The torch.” But, in this, it may be wrong. Perhaps it is not the time to take up quarrels, but the time to make amends. To somehow transform the painful into the beautiful. To take the political, ethnic, economic, or ecological strife and create something that all of humanity can learn and benefit from. To make bombs into spoons and poppies into peace.

IN FLANDERS FIELDS

BY JOHN MCCRAE

In Flanders fields the poppies blow

Between the crosses, row on row,

    That mark our place; and in the sky

    The larks, still bravely singing, fly

Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago

We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,

    Loved and were loved, and now we lie,

        In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:

To you from failing hands we throw

    The torch; be yours to hold it high.

    If ye break faith with us who die

We shall not sleep, though poppies grow

        In Flanders fields.

SOURCES

Image by Eva Elijas from Pexels

Poetryfoundation.org In Flanders Fields

not many of us know where our avocados come from, nor how they reach our supermarkets. The majority of the avocados that we buy in the US and Canada come from the Michoacán region of Mexico (if you’re in Europe, your avocados come from Spain or areas in the Middle East and South America). Local cultivators in Michoacán have grown avocados with sustainable farming practices for generations to feed their families and sell locally.

Rising demand for avocados outside of Mexico caused avocado growing practices to shift away from these sustainable practices and towards harmful farming techniques that use pesticides, artificial fertilizers, huge amounts of water, and more recently, deforested lands, to produce more of the fruit we love. These environmentally destructive farming techniques have made avocados extremely profitable, which benefits local growers. However, this enormous profit has led to a growing number of cartels in the industry, who use (often deadly) intimidation tactics to collect “tax” from local farmers. These cartels also accelerate environmental degradation because they require avocado growers to keep producing at high rates, not giving the soil enough time to recover after each harvest.

GOLD

Since the first gold rush in California in 1848, America has been enamored with gold. It connotes status, prosperity, and class. And besides, it looks pretty on our ears, wrists, and necks. But however glittery gold is, it has a dark side. In the mines of South and Central America, gold cartels are flouting environmental regulations and engaging in human rights abuses in their quest for more profit. A New York Times exposé on cartel-sourced gold in our phones found that Apple and other tech companies were not being completely honest about their claims to use ethical gold. It isn’t necessarily their fault -- one of the most insidious things about cartel gold is that it is just too widespread for even the best-intentioned companies to completely avoid it.

Let’s address the elephant in the room: you can’t think of gold without thinking of jewelry. As a jewelry company, ARTICLE22 tries our best to buy gold that has been ethically sourced. We buy from dealers that recycle gold to try to decrease the amount of new metal in circulation (and decrease the potential for environmental and humanitarian violations). But the point is that no one, not even big companies, can ensure that their gold is ethical -- including us. To be honest, we continue to reckon with our role, ever trying to become as sustainable and ethical as possible.

THE MEANING BEHIND WHAT WE BUY

These two beloved pillars of consumerism are just examples of some of the commodities that have the potential to kickstart conflict, attract conflict, or be produced in the context of conflict. Experts refer to gold as a “conflict commodity” and many say that avocados are on their way to becoming conflict commodities as well. Conflict commodities on the whole have negative environmental, social, and economic impacts for communities that grow, mine, catch, or make such products.

The unfortunate truth is that there’s really no way to ensure that you’re buying 100% ethical gold or avocados. However, just because something is (or is very nearly) a conflict commodity doesn’t mean you should simply boycott it – oftentimes this hurts individual producers and communities more than cartels. So what should we as conscious consumers do? The answer is that there’s no good answer. The fact that we live in a complex and difficult world means that finding solutions to the problem of conflict commodities isn’t as simple as we would like to think. Learning about the hidden supply chains behind some of our favorite products, being mindful about what we purchase and from whom, and buying local are all great starting points.

These issues aren’t going away anytime soon. We at ARTICLE22 would love to hear your thoughts and suggestions on buying ethically in an inherently unethical world.

SOURCES

Marlet.ca The Hidden Cost of Avocados

Nytimes.com How Tainted Gold May Have Ended Up in Your Phone

Occrp.org Report: Colombia Loses Billions to Illegal Gold Trade

Photo from Avocados from Mexico

Photo from Wikipedia Gold Mining

Pulitzercenter.org The weekly: Tracing Conflict Minerals from the Ground to the Consumer

Rotten, Netflix documentary

Theguardian.com Are Mexican Avocados the world's new conflict commodity?