The Missing Link
December 3, 2008
While more and more churches are awakening to God’s call to creation care and stewardship of the earth, I find that relatively few are thinking about environmental impacts on the world’s poor or about broader environmental issues beyond the U.S. border. The connection between poverty and tropical deforestation has long been one of my hot button issues—first because the connection is so close, and second because the rural poor are some of the most forgotten, voiceless people in the world. But I have been told several times recently that people don’t link these issues to creation care:
“Sure we want to begin recycling, saving energy and reducing our carbon footprint, but tropical deforestation? Poverty? Shouldn’t you be talking to the missions committee?”
To be sure, as Americans we have our own set of environmental issues, and recycling and energy savings are great first steps, but environmental problems and their solutions transcend national borders. And we are far more closely connected to the forgotten poor than we think.
Small-scale subsistence agriculture and firewood collection—activities of the poor—are still the biggest contributors to tropical deforestation, which in turn has a dramatic impact on the farmers themselves. Their productivity, nutrition, health and access to fresh water are severely reduced. When the church becomes aware of these issues, we tend to respond by sending health teams and drilling wells—good activities, but ones that often allow us to overlook the causes of the problems. Incredible links also exist between tropical deforestation and migration, illegal immigration, and human trafficking.
But the impacts of deforestation aren’t limited to the poor. Recent studies have linked tropical deforestation to drought and rainfall patterns in the U.S., and deforestation is a huge source of greenhouse gasses, accounting for 25% of man-made emissions. (It is estimated that up to 45% of tropical deforestation is caused by smallholder agriculture, a result of poverty and desperation. Thus we could cut greenhouse gas emissions by 12%, just by responding to the needs of the poor!)
As usual, Scripture has something to say about this, implying the link between deforestation and poverty in Isaiah 41, as God responds to the poor and needy—those who lack water—by planting trees in the wilderness. Similarly, responding to the needs of the poor and working with them to combat tropical deforestation should be a part of a comprehensive creation care program.
The saying, “think globally, act locally,” has been around for many years. Today we have the capacity to think globally and act both locally and globally. Indeed we must.
Scott C. Sabin is the executive director of Floresta, a Christian nonprofit organization that reverses deforestation and poverty in the world by transforming the lives of the rural poor (www.floresta.org).
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I am working on an essay, and I have to build my thesis around green companies and greenwashing. I am so glad that I am able to find an organization who represents Christ, that is focused on this issue, that I can use as a source in my essay. I am proud to stand for Christ in class, and you are making it possible! Thanks for your thoughful actions and attention to people and the environment.
Love in Christ to you!