The
Story of Stuff
Introduction
There is a
need to have a supportable production and consumption. Basically, all materials
flowing through the materials economy goes through the following steps:
extraction, production, distribution, consumption and lastly disposal and
seemingly the system is in crisis. During these processes, the system interacts
with the real world and is always bumping against limits in all the stages (Leonard, 2012).
Extraction
Extraction is the exploitation of
natural resources. During extraction, people use water, cut trees, extract
minerals, wipe out animals and thus exploit natural resources. The planet is
running out resources because of over using the resources. One third of the
natural resources have already been consumed and this weakens the planet’s
ability to support. For example, US has less than 4% of the original forest and
uses more than its share of natural resources and responds to this by using
natural resources from the third world countries, exhausting natural resources
further earth. Basically, 80% of planet’s original forest has been useless
where in Amazon forest, 2000 tress are cut a minutes. Since people do not own
resources, do not have their own means of production, and do not adequately buy
the resources and if one does not won or buy, they do not own the stuff (Leonard, 2012).
Production
Energy is used to mix toxic
chemicals with natural resources to make toxic contaminated products. The
operation of the production system is simply: Toxins in, toxins out. People
keep putting toxins in the industrial production systems and thus constantly
putting chemicals in the environment, homes, schools, bodies, etc. Toxins accumulate through the food chain and
concentrate in human bodies. Factory workers bear the most effects of the
production toxins where they are exposed to toxins and carcinogens. Basically,
through the production process, resources and people get wasted where toxins
leave factories as products and a lot of toxins leave the factory as by-products
causing pollution (Leonard, 2012)
Distribution
Here, distribution involves selling
the contaminated products as fast as possible. The goal here is to keep prices
low, keep people buying and keeps the record moving. The prices are kept low
through externalizing the true costs: where the real cost of making the
products is not captured in the price of the product (Marashi, 2011). For
instance, the store workers are paid ordinary and there is no health insurance
for them. People end up not paying for
the products they buy and this is normally covered by people paying with the
loss of their natural resource base, loss of clean air and such (Leonard, 2012).
Constriction/Use
We have a nation of consumers. The
primary value of an individual is measured by how much one buys and consumes
the products. Consumption rate has risen drastically where an average person
consumes twice as much as compared to 50 years ago. The system is producing
more consumer goods and the strategies used to influence people to buy goods
include:
- Planned
obsolescence: This where goods are designed to become useless very fast
for people to buy them again
- Perceived
obsolescence: This is where people are convinced to get rid of perfectly
useful products through changing the appearance of the same products such
that if one bought the product years ago, it is noticeable that the person
has not contributed to consumption and this is how value is measured
(Jahan, 2011).
Disposal
Consumed materials are disposed into
garbage and this pollutes the air, water, and also has negative climatic
changes. Disposal can be through incineration or through landfills.
Incineration which a common method of disposal releases toxins to the air and
even creates new toxins. However, recycling helps in reducing garbage, and
reducing mining and harvesting of natural resources. Nonetheless, recycling is
not enough because there is a lot of waste since some products cannot be
recycled because some products have too many toxins while others are not
designed to be recycled (Leonard, 2012).
Consumerism in UAE
Consumerism
is widespread in UAE, where there is conspicuous consumption and this has a
likelihood of damaging the economy and hindering the UAE’s efforts of becoming
self-reliant. Consumer spending in UAE is has increased gradually over the last
past years. The increase of consumer spending instead of saving and investing
will continue adversely affecting the local economy (Al-Awsat, 2008).
The high consumption rate in UAE can greatly hinder any plans of transforming
the country from being a consuming to a producing nation. In UAE, there is a
wide range of products, and consumers shopping rate is extremely high (Northrup,
2012).
Conclusion
The system is in a crisis and
deserves transformation so that natural resources and people do not get wasted
and this can be done through saving the forests, cleaning the producing
process, recycling consumed products and such. There is a need to focus on
sustainability, equity, renewable energy, green chemistry, local living economies,
zero waste, and having a closed loop production.
References
Al-Awsat, A. (2008). Alarming Consumer
Splurge Threatens UAE Economy. Dubai
Reuters. < http://www.aawsat.net/2008/06/article55258450>.
Jahan, F. (2011). Ethical
Consumerism can steer sustainable living. Arabian Gazette. < http://arabiangazette.com/ethical-consumerism-steer-sustainable-living/>.
Leonard, A. (2012). Story of Stuff, Full Version; How Things
Work, About Stuff. <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gLBE5QAYXp8>.
Leonard, A. (2012). Disposal.
<http://www.storyofstuff.org/movies-all/story-of- stuff/learn/disposal/>.
Marashi, L. (2011). Living in al thamaneenat. <http://killingdenouement.wordpress.com/tag/consumerism/>.
