Singapore a green country?

The call for saving mother earth is gaining momentum around the world. And Singapore, like all young and impressionable kids, will rush in to join the crowd, to be part of the crowd, to be green. And we have done quite a bit in many areas and even won mentions in our conservation effort, green architecture, energy saving buildings, water conservation, and all the nice little bins around the island to save paper and plastic bottles and drink cans. Hope the cost of the bins is not more than the money saved from collecting papers and plastics. And we gave ourselves a pat for doing such great stuff to save mother earth. So is Singapore really a green country?

Every time I see young people picking plastic bottles trying to save a few pieces of plastic I start to wonder, how much could they save when the country is wasting so much resources unnecessarily? We try to save on plastic bags, on plastic bottles but on the other hand we are wasting and consuming unnecessarily beyond anyone’s imagination.

Our whole economy is built on wasteful pursuits, wasteful consumption and unnecessary consumption that need not be. Economic growth for the sake of economic growth is simply waste, wasting scarce resources of mother earth and in huge quantities. Economic growth, economic activities, particularly the excessive and redundant types, are destroying mother earth at an increasing rate that is unstoppable. Think the number of good cars and vehicles that can run for another 10 or 20 years but scrapped for newer ones! How much resources were wasted? Think of the pulling down of buildings/flats that can last for another 50 or 100 years but pulled down to rebuild! How much wasteful energy and resources were blown away? Think of the number luxury bags, mobile phones, apps, TVs, consumer durables that were used and thrown away when they were in good working conditions! Think artificial gardens.

Think of the crazy idea of increasing population for the sake of economic growth? How much resources and energy will be wasted just to feed the number of mouths, to clothe and house the number of bodies that are called growth?

And we are so happy about saving a few plastic bags, a few plastic bottles, a few drink cans? Go buy, spend, buy and consume for the sake of the economy.