Leonardo DiCaprio enjoyng an e-cigarette in March 2009. The electronic cigarettes are touted as a quitting aid.

E-cigarettes are battery-powered devices that detect the user’s pull and vaporize a nicotine solution that recreates the smoking experience without carcinogens, odour, ashes, stubs, or even litter. Without the 4,000 chemicals added to a traditional burning cigarette, pure nicotine is a relatively harmless drug that’s often compared to caffeine.

Developed several years ago in China, the product didn’t sell much in Asia (a real pack of Chinese smokes costs a mere 40 cents) and was largely ignored in North America. But that all changed in March, when the luscious pout of Leonardo DiCaprio was photographed taking a drag off an e-cigarette. This was great news for Bill Marangos, president of SmokeStik International and maker of the actor’s e-smoke of choice. Before that moment, he says, “98 percent of people didn’t know about this product.”

But with this publicity, however, came some unwanted attention. Pressured by special interest groups, Health Canada—previously wary to even classify the product— cracked the whip in March with an advisory. Since they contain nicotine, SmokeStiks and all other e-cigarettes now require approval under the Food and Drugs Act, and so these products are currently off the market while they undergo Health Canada’s nearly year-long new drug review.

Without their fix, e-smokers are again jonesing for a working quit-aid. Marangos—a former three-pack-a-day smoker—claims SmokeStik’s success rate to be 10 times the measly 5 percent norm, though without any peer review studies available, it’s possible Marangos is just blowing smoke.

So e-cigarettes’ effectiveness as a quitting tool is currently debatable, says Jeff Daiter, chief medical director at Ontario Addiction Treatment Centres. But, he explains, “maybe it’s better than the patch or gum because you get the sensation.” He’s excited to incorporate a nicotine-free version of the device into his addiction research. “The deck is stacked against smokers,” he adds. “Anything we can do would be great.”

In the meantime, e-smokers will have to quit—or keep smoking—the old-fashioned way.

If several high-profile individuals have their way, one of Canada’s major political parties could be on the way to a rebranding even before the summer is out. The New Democratic Party could enter the fall session of parliament with a new name, simply called the “Democratic Party.” The move has been promoted by a mounting number of MPs and other party members at the grassroots.

Two NDP riding associations have passed resolutions calling for a rebranding—simply dropping the “New” from the party name—that will be debated at the party’s national convention in August.

Victoria MP Denise Savoie recently made headlines for expressing support for the idea in Public Eye Online, but she is not the first sitting MP to call for such a rebranding.

Windsor MP Brian Masse says he has favoured a change since his first by-election win in 2002. His reasons are the same as his colleague from Victoria: the party is no longer new.

“Those that are coming into politics or getting interested in Canadian politics need to know that we’re a mainstream political party that has established itself in the Canadian system,” he says.

“This is not an attempt to rewrite our history. It’s an attempt to bring our history forward and to show confidence and pride in a party that has shaped Canadian politics and actually shaped the lives of Canadians—often punching above its weight.”

Masse says he expects other members of parliament and party operatives to come forward with support for the idea in the weeks leading to the convention.

Ian Capstick was for several years a member of Jack Layton’s inner circle. He has since moved into the private sector but remains an NDP member—and he aggressively supports the idea of a name change.

“To be blunt, we’re not new anymore,” he says, adding that he’s aware of support for the resolutions from one end of the country to the other.

MP Peter Stoffer, who has represented a riding on Nova Scotia’s eastern shore for 12 years, says he has advocated a name change for many of those years. He says he has also heard calls for the party to be renamed the Social Democratic Party of Canada.

“I don’t think it’s much of a major discussion that you have to worry about, but I think the grassroots would probably accept it once they’ve heard the arguments,” he says.

Stoffer believes that a name change would be almost purely cosmetic, but Capstick thinks a rebranding would—and should—get the party thinking about more than its name.

“That has to involve policy,” he says.

Capstick suggested that the NDP ought to re-examine its relationship with organized labour. He says that the party isn’t winning the labour vote and that there is no “labour” party in Canada.

“Does it make sense to have so many of the party’s decisions—particularly the leadership—weighted towards the organized labour movement in Canada?” he asks. “I don’t know. I think there is a healthy discussion to be had around that.”

He added that he didn’t want to advocate shutting labour out.

Masse emphasizes that he wants the name-change debate to be a positive one.

“There are a lot of people who like the current acronym, so there will be those who are tied to that,” he says. “But at the same time, once [members] start to think things through, I’m hopeful that we can see some unity on this.”

Recently, long-time party activist Gerald Caplan wrote in the Globe and Mail that, at the party’s August convention, “the only faux-excitement will be an elite-led attempt to change the name.” Capstick disagrees with the assessment that this move is elite-driven.

“Quite frankly, I think the leadership of the party is not entirely impressed with this,” he says, because the change will be costly. It will also spark discussions among provincial parties, some of which have had considerable success with the current name.

Masse says that his riding association’s resolution doesn’t directly impact any provincial NDP.

“We don’t want to force this upon any of the provincial parties, because they are different organizations affiliated together,” he says.

Stoffer expects a name change—if it happens—to coincide with the NDP’s fiftieth anniversary in 2011, but he added that any decision about that is up the party’s members.

Nick Taylor-Vaisey is an Ottawa-based freelancer who writes about federal politics and higher education. His work has appeared in print and online publications across the country, including University Affairs, Capital Xtra and Maclean’s OnCampus. He writes about the effects of the recession on arts groups in the July-August 2009 issue of This Magazine.

98% of so-called "green" products really aren't. Creative Commons photo by fotdmike.

It seems like everything has “gone green” these days. From retailers to celebrities, airlines to hotels, banks to even runway fashion, the environment is sexy in the marketplace for the first time. But is all the publicity really helping Mother Nature? When consumers are being “greeenwashed” in their attempt to fit into a petite size footprint, there is a serious problem-the status quo.

Greenwashing, like whitewashing, is masks inconvenient truths about the sustainability of products and services. By appearing to be environmentally sensitive, companies are earning billions in “green” revenue. Meanwhile, consumers are misled in their attempts to live green, unknowingly contributing further to planetary destruction.

“It’s greenwashing when a company or organization spends more time and money claiming to be ‘green,’ through advertising and marketing, than actually implementing business practices that minimize environmental impact,” says the Greenwashing Index, a web site that rates the authenticity of companies’ and products’ eco-friendliness.

And the sad reality is most green products out there are bogus. Exactly 98% of products that claim green labels in the market place are greenwashed, says a report by the TerraChoice Environmental Marketing in April. The company says there are seven eco-sins that companies commit, including: misleading consumers about the environmental benefits of a product or the practices of a company; hidden trade offs, for example, energy efficiency versus the production of hazardous chemicals; and vagueness, such as using terms like “green,” “eco-friendly,” and “natural.” Does a naturally-occurring substance like formaldehyde conjure up ideas of eco-consciousness for you?

One example of a greenwashing company is Shell. Shell Canada is currently providing grant money for up to $100,000 towards four major initiatives that improve and preserve the Canadian environment, and $10,000 grants to grassroots, action-oriented projects. And in its ad campaigns, Shell promotes itself as sustainable and eco-friendly. Is this true? Is Shell becoming a business leader in our ecologically pivotal time?

I think not. Shell is spending billions to be the lead company in the business of dirty and unconventional oil with the Alberta Tar Sands. That helps to extend our dependency on fossil fuels and contributes to the most destructive and greenhouse gas-intensive method of oil extraction on earth. The Tar Sands produces 40 million tonnes of CO₂ emissions annually for Canada through this project. Such projects make it impossible for us to meet any significant global climate agreement, like Kyoto, and probably Copenhagen.

However, there is an immune response to all this consumer corruption. Today, there are a number of groups that work as third parties in environmental labelling, such as EcoLogo, Energy Star or Green Seal. There are science-based marketing firms that assist in transforming companies to the ‘green path,’ like TerraChoice. And there are numerous references and indexes for the every-day consumer in verifying the genuine nature of a product, like Greenpeace’s Electronics Report and GreenwashingIndex.com.

But with this surge of green-labelling – including some companies that mimic third-party environmental certifications, such as HP’s Eco Highlights products – it’s no wonder why so many of us are still in the dark about greenwashing. Perhaps, as Treehugger.com argues, we need a universal eco-labelling system to make it easier for consumers to really go green.

Or perhaps we need to get our heads out of our greenwashing asses. Making change involves getting smarter. We cannot keep expecting someone else to do it for us. Being informed as a consumer and human being in our choices is our responsibility. Relying on the other guys is what got us into the mess we are in. Like brainwashing, let’s take back our brains back – and leave the washing for cleaning our hybrid cars with biodegradable products.

[image source]

Emily Hunter is an environmental journalist and This Magazine’s resident eco-blogger. She is currently working on a book about young environmental activism, The Next Eco-Warriors, and is the eco-correspondent to MTV News Canada.

More recyclable, sure, but that doesn't make it "green"

The Claim:

Nestlé Waters Canada says its bottled water is a “healthy, eco-friendly choice” and, feeling so confident about this claim, ran an ad in the October 20, 2008, issue of the Globe and Mail stating that its “bottled water is the most environmentally responsible consumer product in the world.” [See the ad here — PDF, 700kb]

The Investigation:

At first glance, there might be something to Nestlé Waters Canada’s claim: It’s made major cuts to its material usage—30 percent less plastic, 20 percent fewer paper labels, 65 percent less corrugate—and plans to make further reductions this year. The company claims to have the “lightest plastic beverage container in the industry,” says John Challinor, director of corporate affairs. And Nestlé Waters Canada and its partners fund nearly 50 percent of Canada’s recycling programs.

But recycling still produces five to 10 percent of the energy used to make new plastic. And due to health regulations, these bottles can only be recycled as non-food products such as carpets, fleece shirts, and blue boxes, rather than as new beverage bottles. Then there’s the fact that one plastic bottle takes anywhere from 450 to 1,000 years to decompose in a landfill. According to Nestlé Waters’ own claims, in Ontario that’s where about 40 percent of water bottles end up.

“Nestlé is trying to spin the bottle by declaring it eco-friendly, when the fact of the matter is there is no green solution for bottled water” says Joe Cressy of the Polaris Institute. Frustrated, his group teamed up with the Council of Canadians, Ecojustice and others to file a complaint with Advertising Standards Canada against Nestlé’s Globe ad.

The Verdict:

That complaint was dismissed for violation of confidentiality after the groups sent out a press release in December 2008, but environmentalists don’t need to hear ASC’s opinion to reject Nestlé’s claims. Says Meera Karunananthan, national water campaigner for the Council of Canadians, “When the carbon footprint of drinking out of your tap is zero, you can’t deny that the environmental impact of bottled water is more harmful.”

Illustration by Dave Donald

Marketers will slap the “green” label on just about anything. Don’t be fooled

I have no qualms with calling myself a conscious consumer. If there’s a label, I read it. If there’s not, I ask. I like to know what’s in the products I buy, where they come from, and who made them. I care about the price, sure, but I also care about the environmental and social impacts of the global supply chain that brought them from the field or factory to my shopping cart. I don’t want my jeans sewn by a 12-year-old girl, an oldgrowth tree felled so I can blow my nose in Kleenex-y comfort, or my tomatoes shipped to my plate from halfway around the world.

And, these days, there’s a good chance you don’t either. A quarter of American adults are what Hugh Hough calls “awakening consumers.” The president of Green Team, a New York-based communications and advertising agency that specializes in environmental issues, says shoppers who realize they can effect change through their everyday purchases are wielding more and more power in the marketplace. With billions of dollars of ethical consumer spending up for grabs, it’s not surprising some of the world’s biggest companies are scrambling to get a piece of the eco-friendly pie.

But how can consumers sort legitimate green claims from false advertising — making sure their choices have an impact — given the number of companies that boast eco-friendly products?

Take Procter & Gamble, for example. The consumer-products giant plans to spend US$20 billion over the next five years developing and marketing eco-friendly products. Household staples such as Charmin toilet paper and Bounty paper towels now come with more sheets per roll to reduce waste. A truly eco-friendly choice would be, of course, to simply wipe up the spill with an old rag. But you can’t sell that for $1.99.

P&G isn’t the only company reaching for our green dollars: I can buy recycled gift paper and eco-beauty products at Pistachio, a new retail offering from Heather Reisman of Indigo Books fame; I can light my home with energy produced by “clean coal”; and my grocery store tempts me with something new and organic (and usually vacuum-packaged) on the shelf every week. Everything from cars to coffee to nuclear power is being peddled as green consumer choices.

Of course, any environmentalist will tell you that coal isn’t clean and nuclear power isn’t green. So why are they being sold as such? Because they can.

It’s called greenwashing, and it’s a major obstacle for eco-conscious consumers. TerraChoice Environmental Marketing Inc. defines greenwashing as the act of misleading consumers about the environmental practises of a company or the environmental benefits of a product or service.

Its 2007 study of more than 1,000 consumer products found all but a handful guilty of overplaying their environmental benefits in one of several “sins” of greenwashing — making irrelevant claims; being vague, offering no proof; or other forms of deception. Many ordinary products were simply relabelled with environmentally friendly-sounding slogans.

Chevrolet is one of my personal favourites. In an industry that has emitted more carbon out of its collective tailpipe than perhaps any other, the company’s 2009 marketing tagline is “gas-friendly to gas-free.” The vehicles in its latest lineup are the very same (minus the much-anticipated Volt electric car) it sold in the past, except back then most of their ads touted their speed and powerful engines — hardly eco-friendly.

Much of today’s green marketing is more about branding than anything brand new. So what’s a conscious consumer to do? Enviro-marketing experts say the best thing is to reward companies that are transparent. Mountain Equipment Co-op, for example, recently published the locations of its offshore suppliers, among the first clothiers in Canada to do so. Similarly, Timberland puts a “nutritional label” on its boxes of shoes, spelling out the company’s environmental, labour, and community impact statistics. Regulation is coming, but slowly.

Companies in Canada face new guidelines for marketing environmental messages recently released by the Competition Bureau and the Canadian Standards Association. While the guidelines are voluntary, violators accused of false advertising face fines or removal of their products from store shelves. Certified eco-labelling agencies, such as EcoLogo and Green Seal, are also good measures of authenticity.

In the end, the best way to vote with your dollars for a more sustainable world is simply to buy less. After all, buying more stuff, even if it’s “green” stuff, is still more stuff. Stuff that costs the planet resources to make, to ship, to clean, to store, and ultimately to dispose of. And you don’t need a label to know that.