Monday, April 28, 2008

Go Green Expo, Hilton, NYC April 26-27

First, the good news: the expo was busy and filled with "mainstream" people--the green movement is working!

However, the bad news is that the organizers allowed companies that were not green to exhibit. The most egregious was , or Cotton Incorporated. They shared a booth with Good Housekeeping Magazine. When I asked a GH rep why they were at the expo, the woman nervously told me that the magazine "was going to write some green articles" and that they were with Cotton."

Cotton Incorporated is attempting to convince the public that they are sustainable. On their website, the CEO claims that Cotton is using 50 % less pesticides than they used to.

However, that is still a lot of pesticides. Pesticides are doused on growing cotton. The result is degradation of the water, air and land where the crops are grown. The end product—from clothing to the furniture in your home—leeches onto the wearer and into the environment.

Only corn is doused with more pesticides than cotton grown in United States. 1.25 pounds of pesticides, defoliants, and other chemicals are used to grow the cotton in every set of queen-size sheets, and up to one-third goes into every t-shirt. The EPA…lists seven of the most common pesticides used in cotton fields as ‘known human carcinogens.’

On the Cotton website, they use the words "natural", "sustainable", "true","responsible" and "renewable".

Cotton is natural until you add chemical-based pesticides to it.

Pesticide treated cotton is not sustainable, as it is harmful to the planet and its inhabitants.

"True" is a meaningless term.

Pesticides on cotton is not responsible, as the chemicals harm the environment.

Cotton is renewable, but the petroleum based chemical pesticides that douse cotton are not.

http://www.harmoniousenvironment.com

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