Making the Invisible Visible:
The Aspen Environment Forum
By Haley Carmer, Hoffman Scholar
This spring break I was fortunate enough to attend the Aspen Environment Forum thanks to the Hoffman Scholars program offered through the Center of the American West. On Thursday morning, the first day of the conference, several of the forum's speakers presented their "big ideas" for solutions to our current environmental crisis. Organic and local food markets, progressive renewable energy programs, and green economy objectives were just a few of the ideas put forward in these talks. But the presenter that struck me most was Majora Carter, an environmental justice advocate and my newly acclaimed idol. She is the founder and executive director of Sustainable South Bronx, a nonprofit organization aimed at greening the South Bronx and getting the community involved and excited about the green movement. Majora's "big idea" for a more sustainable future was to make the invisible communities that bear a disproportionate share of environmental problems visible to the rest of the nation while making a connection between the local and the global. As the conference went on I began to realize that this theme of making the invisible visible was a common thread among every session I attended.
Later that Thursday, Professor E.O. Wilson spoke about the threat of a loss of biodiversity due to global warming. Life on this planet is incredibly diverse and vastly unknown to humans; what we see in zoos or botanical gardens is a microscopic portion of all the species on Earth. To give us a sense of how little we truly know about our planet, as Wilson put it, there are approximately 1 billion bacteria representing 5,000-6,000 species in one gram of soil. In order to foster biophilia and bring the wonders of flora and fauna to the masses, Wilson and a group of scientists are working on a new project called "The Encyclopedia of Life." Once completed, this web-based encyclopedia will catalog the 1.6 million plant and animal species known to science. The idea behind such an endeavor is that making the previously unknown majesties of life visible to a wider array of people will spark a committed interest by the population to save and protect them.
Cheryl Rogowski, a farmer from the Hudson Valley in New York, was featured on several panels discussing the future of food. Her family has been farming for generations, but when a pest infestation threatened the survival of her farm it was clear that business as usual could not continue. Cheryl was forced to make a choice: either throw in the towel or drastically change her farming practices. She chose the latter and transformed the Rogowski farm from a monocrop onion farm to a diverse and lively operation that cultivates 250 different types of produce every year. Not only does Cheryl utilize eco-friendly and low-impact methods to grow the crops but she also participates in community-supported agriculture, farmers' markets, and programs that bring fresh produce to low-income families in New York City. Connecting people with their food source is a huge driver in how Cheryl runs her business. As she puts it, our food has a face, and making that forgotten face visible is essential to food reform in this country.
My favorite presentation of the conference was given by Majora Carter and Van Jones on the last day of the forum. Both Majora and Van work with low-income communities in New York and Oakland, respectively, to bring them out of poverty and cure the social ills that arise from these conditions. Despite being on opposite sides of the country, both individuals came to the conclusion that a green economy would be the most effective mechanism for achieving their goals. There is no doubt that major changes need to be made to the traditionally overconsumptive, fossil-fuel-dependent American lifestyle if we expect posterity to inherit a habitable planet. One of the challenges of the environmental movement is making the connection between "twenty years from now and next Tuesday." Green-collar jobs, according to Majora and Van, are the providers of today and the savior of the future; these "clean-tech" jobs take people off the streets and put them to work making cities more environmentally sensitive and sustainable. We all know this work needs to be done, so why not give it to people who need it?
The Aspen Environment Forum has left me with optimism and excitement about the direction we are headed. With funding for green jobs and green cities written into the approved Energy Bill, a growing trend toward organic and local food, a blossoming renewable energy industry supported by multiple state governments, and a rising national environmental consciousness, it's clear that people are waking up to the crisis we are facing. The tools necessary to cultivate a bright and sustainable future for the planet and humanity are in place, and what remains now is a matter of implementation. Getting the government on the side of the problem solvers, not the problem makers, is one step in the process of change, but we as individuals also have a large role to play. By making the personal and economic benefits of a green society visible to all sectors of the population, America can finally live up to its promise today and in generations to follow.