Dartmouth Dining Service representatives take every opportunity to congratulate themselves on the College's growing recycling programs and environmental consciousness. Two weeks ago, the College and the town of Hanover proudly announced they would receive funding for an expanded composting program. Funny that $17,000 of the funding, to be spent researching the costs and benefits of the new program, come from an organization deemed by the Wilderness Society to be an environmental ghoul.
The American Forest & Paper Association (AF&PA) aggressively supported the July 1995 Salvage Logging Act which -- to the dismay of congresspeople, citizens and activists -- allows unchecked logging of old growth forest. AF&PA is funding research to analyze the "cradle-to-grave" costs and benefits of composting. No doubt they are more interested in the grave, where their paper plates and wooden spoons will compost away as the College invests in a new round of biodegradable AF&PA products.
The problematic bias of the benefactor aside, however, the College, under the guise of greening the Dartmouth community, needn't accept support from an organization which not only threatens old growth forest and endangered species habitat, but which also acts to limit public participation in environmental legislation.
More and more often, environmental offenders attempt to clear their names while they continue to dismantle protective environmental legislation, threaten fragile wilderness habitat, and pollute the nation's air, water, and public lands. This attempt to attract positive publicity is often termed "greenwashing." In this case, AF&PA will receive positive media attention for fielding a study, in partnership with Dartmouth College, on the economic and environmental advantages of diverting the College's organic waste. Amid the pro-environment publicity, AF&PA will quietly continue logging old growth forest in the Pacific Northwest.
Dartmouth is in a position to make a significant statement about AF&PA's offenses, and is uniquely poised to initiate protest against organizations which simulate environmental accountability while acting irresponsibly.
A campus which pronounces itself green should not mistake the opportunity. Dartmouth's choice not to accept the $17,000 of funding from AF&PA would attract important media attention to AF&PA's inequities, and would pressure other institutions to similarly reevaluate partnerships with organizations like AF&PA.
There is no question that the benefits of expanded composting programs in campuses and communities across the nation -- a possible outcome of AF&PA's proposed study -- would be significant. But Dartmouth has the potential to initiate farther-reaching environmental reform by dissociating with AF&PA. And at a college which recently spent $450,000 to gut and rebuild offices for an undergraduate secret society, it is hard to believe the administration would be unable to find alternative funding for the study.
If plans continue as arranged, one has to wonder -- in this community which applauds itself for its environmental conscience -- who's doing the greenwashing.
