Jasmine's Ecological footprint

MY ECOLOGICAL FOOTPRINT AT A GLANCE

I used to think that I am much more ecofriendly than most of my peers. However, this exercise has proven that I am ‘environmentally high maintenance’ as well. Haha. Food actually accounts for 41% of my footprint. However, this is probably due to the fact that Singapore is not self-sufficient and needs to import most of its food supplies.

PROBLEMS IN CALCULATING MY ECOLOGICAL FOOTPRINT

In my previous semester, I did a similar exercise for another geography module. However, my peers and I found out that it difficult to calculate OUR ecological footprints accurately. This is because, most ecological footprint calculators ignore spatial inequalities and differences (e.g. Singapore is not self sufficient and needs to import most of its food supplies). With that, we also realized that most countries, like Singapore, had not designed an ecological footprint calculator that is appropriated for calculating the ecological footprints of its people.

I am aware that this exercise ignores the problems relating to the methodology of these footprint results. However, through this we can also see how Singapore(ans) handles environmental issues in a lack-luster manner. In saying that, I am also aware of the several centralized and pragmatic greening strategies that Singapore had undertaken to promote a "Garden City' (see this paper: http://www.rnzih.org.nz/pages/2003_Conference_Proceedings_PDFs/28_Mason_Tan_Beng_Jin.pdf). With that, we can also question the potency of such centralized and pragmatic measures in promoting environmental sustainability, since most of its people are still poorly equipped with environmentally-friendly practices.

In this exercise, I chose ‘Australia” for the same reasons as Sabrina. With that, I do say that the results are grossly inaccurate. However, it can still be used as a reflection of my environmentally unsustainable practices.

PRACTICES I CAN ADOPT TO REDUCE MY ECOLOGICAL FOOTPRINT

Basically, I have to change my consumption habits and patterns.

1. In terms of lowering my food miles, I would choose produce grown locally. Local produce are actually cheaper as well! However, this attempt is greatly impaired with the fact that most of the food supplies we get are imported, in some way or another (e.g. fertilizers used for planting).

2. In terms of lowering my mobility footprint, I would do car-sharing whenever possible. Car travelling in private vehicles account for a huge part of my ecological footprint. My friends (approximately 8 in my usual clique) and I would usually use our own cars whenever we go to school or meet up. We do this in the name of ‘convenience’, when most of us actually stay in the same area. Hence, by doing car-sharing, I would probably be able to reduce my ecological footprint by a great extent.

RESOURCE INPUTS AND WASTE OUTPUTS IN NUS

Universities like NUS use a ton of energy everyday to power its activities. Most of the energy is used to power up ACs (which temperatures are set at ridiculously low levels). As said in one of the NUS guest lectures for this module, energy accounts for the most part of NUS’s ecological footprint.

INNOVATIVE STRATEGIES USED IN NUS

I am certainly amazed that NUS is going to participate in the “Earth Hour’ program. In this program, the campus switches off all electrical appliances for an hour. This is done to promote its greater aim of enhancing environmental sustainability.

This strategy definitely challenges the normalized notion of cities. Most of us would visualize cities, as a city that is punctuated with ‘bright lights’, 24/7. This is in sync with the notion of growth in these capitalistic cities that ‘never sleeps’. Indeed, the lights act as a visual representation of ‘a city that never sleeps’. In ‘Earth Hour’, NUS challenges the notion that ‘a city never sleeps because it is constantly lighted’, by switching appliances that are responsible for ‘lighting up’ the city.

STRATEGIES NUS CAN IMPLEMENT

1. About a week ago, my friend from YALE commented that we, Singaporeans (NUS students), print a lot of our stuffs. He mentioned that students at YALE hardly print any of their readings because everything is electronized and could be easily accessed online without needing to run to the library. As far as I know, the printing practice of NUS students, consume tons of paper a year. As such, I would hope that NUS Library would take trouble to electronize all library materials. Professors should then further encourage students to use this facility by uploading these electronized versions onto the E-Reserves portion of our learning website (IVLE).

2. NUS should encourage its students to go around promoting environmentally friendly practices. Singapore has a small tightly-knitted community. Hence, this might actually prove to be effective in promoting a more environmentally sustainable Singapore.

In answering the last part to this question, I think it is very difficult to say ‘who is responsible’. The scales at which social agents act are overlapping. Moreover, varying degrees of socio-political powers are embedded at different scales and levels. But personally, I am an advocate of ‘environmental sustainability begins with me’. This is because, I feel that, being a person (often thought of as the ‘smallest’ scale), I yield a certain degree of socio-political power at different scales (e.g. me as the president for a club). With this, I am able to promote changes in behaviour at all scales, from the scale of a body to even one of a nation. More importantly, I am doing my bid to enhance environmental sustainability. And if everyone does just that, the world would be a much more sustainable one.