Episode 5 - Re-cycling Kids’ Clothes to Reduce Overconsumption
This is a story of children’s clothing, textiles, time passing, and the valiant confrontation of overconsumption. While it would be easier to buy cheap and new - and for those cute disposable clothes to end up in relentlessly growing landfills that our planet cannot sustain - there is a quiet, under-recognized network of women who care for and re-cycle children’s clothes. They lovingly organize, clean, fold, box, label, and share children’s clothes with their sisters and friends at the vulnerable time of new motherhood, while asking big questions about consumption and systems. This is a story of circular kids' fashion.
Reseed host Alice Irene Whittaker is joined by Jad Robitaille, the Founder and Owner of Mini-Cycle, and the mother of two daughters. She has decided to centre her life on combating fast fashion while also cultivating balance in her own life. Jad discusses how she is rescuing and re-cycling clothing as many times as possible, lowering the impact on the environment while working to make circular kids fashion more affordable and accessible.
Jad and Alice Irene tackle several questions. What language resonates more with citizens - circular economy or zero waste? How can we carefully avoid the pitfalls of greenwashing? How can motherhood shape life, career, and the choices we make? What are the demands and freedoms of owning your own business and entrepreneurship, and what are the innovative business models that can make the big shifts we require? How can we avoid perfectionism and unrealistic expectations in the zero waste movement?
Cycling our garments over and over is a powerful way to reduce impact on the natural world, in so many ways. This interconnects with greenhouse gas emissions, materials, water, biodiversity, and human hands involved in unethical labour. Natural fibres connect with reducing emissions, the end of the life of pieces, and human health. Wearing clothing often, caring for garments carefully, mending, swapping, and fostering secondhand purchasing are ways in which we can be better stewards of the materials and labour that go into creating our textiles. Through our choices about clothing, and by disrupting the fashion industry, we are caring not just for children of today but also future generations.
Episode Show Notes
Transcript
Alice Irene Whittaker (intro): Welcome to Reseed, a podcast about repairing our relationship to nature. Reseed tells the stories of a RE generation: the people embracing repair, redesign, reuse, and reduction. The people who are uprooting the extractive status quo and rooting the future in justice, wellbeing, resilience, and care. This is a podcast for those of us who are re-imagining our relationship to the natural world and to each other. I am Alice Irene Whittaker, the host of Reseed. Together, let's plant the seeds that transform us from being takers to caretakers.
Alice Irene: Welcome. Today, I speak with Jad Robitaille from Mini-Cycle, a Montreal startup that specializes in circular economy for kids’ fashion. She and I talk about reducing waste and how to make zero waste more accessible. We get into greenwashing, gender, motherhood, and of course, how quickly our children are growing. We discuss decentralizing resources, the connections between land, dyes, materials, and our bodies, as well as the emotional side of considering climate change in these years to come.
Jad Robitaille: I don't think it's about being perfectly zero waste, but I think it's really important to ask yourself these questions. When you throw something in the garbage, that's going somewhere, it's not just you throw it away. So as soon as you start asking yourself the question, it becomes a heavier burden to carry, but you're not blinded anymore. And you're trying your best to make the best decisions as you can.
Alice Irene: First, a story. When I was first pregnant with my daughter, I went to a thrift store, unsure of how many onesies a new infant requires, but quite sure that I wanted to embrace secondhand clothing with my expected mysterious child. It was and is important to me that I reduce the waste and environmental impact that I have through the clothing that I choose to put on my body and on my family.
Alice Irene: I don't know how many children wore those onesies before my daughter did, but I do know that she wore them as well as three of my friend's children, my two sons after that and my new nephew. These sweet little garments have had many lives. They've clothed many wee ones. There is a quiet under recognized network of women who on top of much labor, lovingly organize, clean, fold, box, label, and share children's clothes with their sisters and friends at this vulnerable time of new motherhood.
Alice Irene: These parents, most often women, then spend large amounts of time over the course of years organizing clothing over the arc of seasons and unearthing boxes from crawl spaces and attics and the backs of closets. Time capsules of their children's lives – mittens, sweaters, boots, and coats come out from last winter, measuring how much time has passed and how much their children have grown in the seasons of the year.
Alice Irene: This is a story of children's clothing – yes, and textiles, time passing and the valiant confrontation of overconsumption. It would be easier to buy cheap and new. And for those cute disposable clothes to end up in relentlessly growing landfill that our planet cannot sustain it. Especially when we're having babies for the first time companies market to us and know it's this time when you're making decisions for the first time ever, and you want just the best for your child. And at that time, they really try and actually convince you to make new purchases and new purchasing habits that you stay in for years.
Alice Irene: This is another story though. The one that we're going to hear today, the story of circular kids’ fashion. Jad Robitaille is the founder and owner of Mini-Cycle and the mother of two daughters. She has decided to center her life on combating fast-fashion while also cultivating balance in her own life and business. Circling our garments over and over is a powerful way to reduce impact on the natural world in so many ways. This interconnects with greenhouse gas, emissions, materials, water biodiversity, and the human hands that are involved in labor.
Alice Irene: Every time a piece of clothing is used for nine months, it decreases its environmental footprint by 25%. And so wearing clothing often, caring for garments carefully, mending, swapping, and fostering secondhand purchases are ways in which we can be better stewards of the materials and labor that go into creating clothing. Jad will talk more about how she is rescuing and recycling clothing as many times as possible, lowering the impact on the environment while also working to make circular kids' fashionmore affordable and more accessible.
Alice Irene: Before my conversation with Jad I'll briefly let you know that I released another episode today with David Côté co-founder of LOOP Mission, a project that works to reduce food waste by rescuing perfectly good produce that is headed for landfill, and then they transform it into everything from fresh press juice to gin.
Alice Irene: David, like Jad, who you'll hear from in just a few moments, is also creating and advancing the circular economy in Montreal, Canada. And because of these interconnections, I've released both episodes today, a bit of a theme. You can expect episodes of Reseed to come out every two weeks. And the next episode is with Erica Violet Lee and Brianna Brown from Indigenous Climate Action on January 3rd in the new year. If you're enjoying Reseed, please consider leaving a review on Apple podcasts and share the podcast with people in your life with whom you think it would resonate. Okay. Here is my conversation with Jad Robitaille
Alice Irene: Hi, Jad. Thanks so much for joining me today. I really appreciate it.
Jad: Hi Alice. Thanks for having me. I'm happy to be here.
Alice Irene: My pleasure. So I wanted to start by asking about you as a child and your relationship with the natural world.
Jad: So my grandfather had, well, we still have that land, but we have a land maybe 45 minutes away from Montreal. We call it Up North. And so my grandparents would take care of us often there, and we have like a hundred acres of forest up there. So now my dad lives there and I know the forest by heart, like the type of plants and you know, which rock to climb. And so I feel like this was really my natural world as a child that grew up in the city. So I would spend a lot of time there and being connected with nature. My grandparents would leave us be even as a young child. So we'd go in the forest and walk on our own and just explore with our cousins. So I'd say that's my connection to the natural world and it's a place I've been going to ever since I was a baby and I still go there and I'm still introducing my daughters to the same land. It holds a very special place for me.
Alice Irene: Beautiful. One of my favorite quotes is from Jane Goodall. It is the piece of the forest that I carry inside. And I always love that and feel that when I'm in the forest.
Jad: Yeah, exactly. And so ever since my grandparents passed away and we buried their ashes there between special trees and also two years ago, my dog passed away. So I planted a new tree and put her ashes underneath. So it's really that legacy that land is giving. And I feel like when I'm there, I think more about generations, what it was like for my grandparents, my grandfather, as a kid to be here and my dad, and when my dad met my mom, they would go and walk on that land too. And now when I'm teaching my children to like how to enjoy forest and the type of trees and the leaves, and it's very special.
Alice Irene: I’m picturing in my mind, all of your footsteps over the same path, you know, all the different generations over time.
Jad: Yeah. Yeah. You can't describe the feeling. It is just very magical.
Alice Irene: I wanted to move over from the past and you as a child to where you are now and wanted to hear about Mini-Cycle, which you founded and lead. So where did the idea come from and what are you doing with it today?
Jad: I did a bachelor's degree in commerce, and then I went on to do a master's degree in environmental studies where I focused on green buildings and renewable energy, passive house certification related to how to make buildings more efficient. And then while I was doing my master's degree, I became pregnant with my first child. So moved back to Montreal and then I finished my thesis from home essentially, to be closer to my family. And then when I finished someone approached me to teach Strategies for Sustainability at McGill as a course lecturer, which I did. And at that point I was again pregnant and I was just looking on, I didn't know what to do. I knew that I had now young children.
Jad: It kind of changed my perspective of what a career should be like and how I wanted it to split my time between my family and the career that I wanted to build. And so as I was teaching Strategies for Sustainability, I studied more and more circular economy. And so oftentimes my feeling was there was a lot of literature and a lot of studies on how to make food systems more sustainable, how to make transportation systems more sustainable, how to make the building industry more sustainable. And then I had my children, I had to dress them. And then I started, it was so wasteful because they're growing up so fast.
Jad: And then I didn't really have the means to buy like a $50 piece for each single little piece. But then I didn't want to encourage the fast fashion and anything that was made from polyester. Then I was looking on Marketplace or Craigslist or Kijiji and everything I could find was always more fast fashion. And I was thinking, where do these good pieces end up and who buys them? What happens in that industry? Especially for children, because it's really a need to dress them because they're growing up and we have no other choice, but to dress them.
Jad: So that's kind of how I started the idea of when Mini-Cycle in the sense that I wanted to give tools to parents to be able to shop sustainably and teach them what a sustainable piece looks like. But at the same time, try to find ways to make it more accessible because when it's new, you might want to buy one piece but you might not be able to buy your whole child's closet with just sustainable new pieces. So that's where the idea of buying new and secondhand and guaranteeing to buy it back came from. Really allowing people to do a, kind of a mix and match between the new and the second hand.
Jad: And then give them incentives, like financial incentives, to bring it back. And then offer it in the secondhand at a discounted price so it's more accessible. The other idea with this was that oftentimes if people were buying the good pieces new, they're not the ones that necessarily want to participate in the secondhand market. So by offering them the new pieces, and then when you come back, they have a credit, they can buy again, new pieces. So all of a sudden you're able to include them in that second hand market, even though they're not the one purchasing it, but then they're the one bringing them back. Whereas oftentimes when it's this thrift store, they'll get a credit to that thrift store but if they're not ones that buys secondhand, then that doesn't help solve the problem.
Alice Irene: Right. I think that what you pointed out where, you know, there's so much literature on the food systems and buildings and circular economy, but not fashion and textiles, I think is quite a gendered thing. Like it's counted as frivolous or only for women when all of us engage with that industry.
Jad: Exactly, if you look at Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, dressing yourself is part of it. You have to protect your body against the elements and the kids, they grow up so fast. So they need, especially in our climate, they need winter boots, they need good coats. They need everything. We don't need to over purchase, but it's still a need. And that's why for women too, is just that women has turned into a thing that's like renewable, but not because we need it, but just because we want to be like last fashion, but for children really it's an essential need
Alice Irene: I saw that with my own children too, when they were born, you know, they're flying through clothing so quickly. And what do you do with something that you've only worn three times?
Jad: And it's not something you think about before you have children, but once you have children, you realize like, wow, just a management of things. It's complicated, you know, like he's like make a box for the next season. Is it going to still fit by them? I don't know. Then it doesn't fit. How do you dispose of it properly?
Alice Irene: It's a real job. I find that I have three kids that are all two years apart and so there’s a future and past box for each of them. But I also think it sort of measures time. If you put something away that looks too big and all of a sudden it fits them and you notice how time how passed.
Jad: Yeah, exactly. It goes by so quickly.
Alice Irene: I’d like to explore motherhood more and how being a mother has shaped what you've chosen to do. You spoke to that a little bit in your last answer, but it'd be interesting to delve into motherhood and how it relates.
Jad: So when I had my first, I was still studying and it was a surprise so I was kind of trying to hide it cause I wanted to finish teaching and not be like super big. So I finished, I did my master's degree in Kingston, Ontario. So I left when I was six months pregnant. I remember it was in December, so it was kind of a clean cut because I left when it was Christmas break.
Jad: And before actually doing my master's degree, I was working at Bombardier Transportation and I had super high career plans, super focused on my career. I knew exactly where I was going. And then I had my first child and everything went out the window. It's like as if life slowed down and I just wanted to be with my child and take care of her. And so after the one year maternity leave, I was not ready to send her to daycare. So I really took my time. I took 18 months. And then when she was 18 months, I put her only three days in the morning. And I did a very, very gradually. Just cause I wanted to enjoy that time with her and I wanted to be there for her.
Jad: Obviously I understand that not everyone has that luxury, but it was something that we decided to do and sacrifice other parts, financial parts of our lives for me to be with my child. And then so I became pregnant again when the first one was 18 months. So I never really started working again. You know, I do some projects here and there, but I think I stopped if I don't count my masters. So I did my master's degree within that time. And I did teach within that time, but I was not a full-time hire anywhere for a good five years. And so after when my youngest was maybe two. I thought, okay, now it's time. I'll go back to work. I'll find a job.
Jad: And since I had done all these studies and my master's degree in environmental studies and before then I was a project manager for a train system. So I was trying to find something in sustainability and project management. The career search was so, so depressing that I had the impression that maybe I was not being considered because I had a hole in my CV. Maybe it's a wrong impression. I don't know. But, so that's kind of what pushed me also to start my own business. I kind of knew I wanted to build my own thing, but I had just had never had like an aha idea that came to me.
Jad: Teaching has helped me brainstorm and think about different concepts. And that's really where the idea came from. And even though owning your own business is very demanding, very stressful. It's not as if you don't have a boss, my boss is my clients, my boss is my employees. I owe everything to them. But I can make my own schedule. And that for me is very important. So my children, they go to school nine to three, so I'm able to drop them off and pick them up. Just work later in the day. Sometimes I'll alternate to it my mom and my partner. I feel like they have a good balance because we're able to have a flexible schedule. And I'm very, very thankful for that. And also it goes so quickly. You know, there are five and seven already, like soon they won't need me anymore. So I'm really happy that I can be there for them.
Alice Irene: It's so nice to be needed like that in those early years.
Jad: Yeah, exactly.
Alice Irene: So think that stood out to me on your website was this idea of accessibility, which is quite prominent there and how we make circular economy accessible to everyone. How we make sure that these ethical organic garments are accessible to everybody. So how do you think we can approach accessibility as a circular economy community?
Jad: There's different aspects of it. My belief is that for social business or social entrepreneurship, or environmentally oriented businesses to work, they have to be scalable. And by scalable, we mean also accessible. So that's one of the biggest challenges I have with Mini-Cycle. So there's scalable from the business part, but there is also scalable like, is it big enough? Can we reach enough people in the market to participate? Because the idea is you don't want sustainability to be a thing of only for elite and people who have money or else you won't be able to make a dent in the industry that you're trying to change.
Jad: So as you know, Mini-Cycle doesn't make their own clothes. My first idea was that there's enough people making enough clothes in this world. I'll just facilitate the flow of these clothes in a more meaningful way. The clothes that we sell new, I have no control over the retail price because the retail price is set by the brands that make them. So they have a certain cost. They have a certain margin than you need to make. And so I'm pretty much at the mercy of these prices. So on that end, the only thing I can make accessible is make it easy for people to shop for it and easy for them to receive it at home, if they're busy with their children.
Jad: And so it makes shopping much easier and make the website as user-friendly as possible. But then we're thinking price point. So the price is very high on new sustainable, made with noble fibers pieces or it's expensive. So that's the point I'm trying to tackle everyday, trying to brainstorm on how to bring those clothes to people who have probably a lower purchasing power so that they can also be included in the circular economy.
Jad: We have kind of three chapters to our websites. So the first one is the new stuff, which again is, okay, you might buy one or two pieces, or if you have a big purchasing power, you might buy everything. But really not for everyone. Then we have the second chapter which is called rescues. So what we do is when a vendor or a shop or a brand produced too much, or is closing down, oftentimes they'll reach out to us and see if we can buy the rest of their inventory. Obviously, we try for these pieces to fit our FO's like to make sure that they're made sustainably because we guarantee to buy back everything.
Jad: So we can't just buy like random stuff made from polyester. But if they fit our criteria, we'll buy it back. We buy it at half of the original wholesale price, so we will resell at half of the original retail price. So that allows us to offer a better price point to our customers. And the thing that's really interesting is when they bring it back, we always use the original retail value to price the amount that we give back to our customers. So if someone bought something for, let's say $50 in the rescues, but it was originally worth a hundred and then they bring it back and it's still like new so we'll be able to resell it for probably almost the same price that it was purchased rescues. So it means we'll give back $25 to that person.
Jad: So all of a sudden that's super good piece cost them $25. And then the third chapter is obviously the recycled pieces. So oftentimes if they're more worn the price point will be maybe 30% of its original retail value. So that becomes much more interesting for the person who's purchasing it to participate in the circular economy. The only issue with that is it's limited. While it's still, for me, it's a lot, but it's not enough to answer to the demand. But we add about 350 to 400 pieces every week on our website. And I'd say like in an hour, 70% of it is sold. So there's really a demand for it. Again, when I talked about scalability, it's putting one secondhand piece online takes so much effort. You need to put in place some systems of standardization and technologies to make it scalable and make all these processes faster. So I feel like if you want a circular economy to work, technology has to back it. The price point has to be there. And also the way that the pieces are built is very important. The types of material, how you can rematerialize the stuff that was produced in the first place, so that it avoids the landfill at all costs.
Alice Irene: You mentioned circular economy. Right now, while you're speaking and in your materials for Mini-Cycle, and I'm wondering from your vantage point, have you seen over the past three years, and even before that, when you were studying circular economy, have you seen that it's gaining momentum as a term with individual citizens and the public? And have you ever grappled with, do we use the words circular economy? Or do we speak about it in a different way? Is it too technical? Just that term itself.
Jad: So at the beginning I would never use circular economy three years ago and that's essentially why we're called zero waste kids’ fashion, because the idea is exactly it is once you're done with your clothes, if you don't know what to do with it, we'll take it back and we'll figure out what to do with it. It won't go to landfill. Zero waste is a term that people know much more than circular economy. So yeah, if you go on our website and you won't see Mini-Cycle circular economy, you'll see a zero waste kids’ fashion. I do mention it in the about, cause I feel like people who want to learn more might be interested in knowing more the terms that kind of a director mission, I mean cycle.
Jad: But I do think that now when I say circular economy, people know what I'm talking about. I feel like in the last five years, it's changed a lot. Like people have heard of circular economy, then they might not understand a hundred percent what it means. It's not a foreign word or a technical word that they can’t grasp. So they do understand it, but I still feel like for now keeping zero waste kids’ fashion is a better way to describe it, to reach as many people as possible.
Alice Irene: I've been seeing that too and seeing the term in media and also in businesses and brands are using it more overtly. We are a circular economy in nature versus a few years ago and it was a little more obsolete. I've actually looked it up online where you can track different terms over time, and you can see that sustainability stays sort of the same, zero waste has a huge spike and then kind of evens out in circular economy seems to be on that upward trend right now.
Jad: So maybe in a year or two, we won't be zero waste. The kids' fashion will be circular economy. You don't want to just use circular economy. It's like a circular business model. It's just that circular economy encloses a lot of stuff I would maybe not use just circular economy. It would be probably circular kids fashion or something like that.
Alice Irene: Right. That makes sense. Yeah. That makes sense. It's so complex and has so many nuances.
Jad: I'm super careful the words that we use on the website, because there's so much greenwashing and so much misuse of words.
Alice Irene: So do you see your role as sort of this intermediary, making sure that you avoid greenwashing, like a way to filter it out in what you sell?
Jad: Yeah, for sure. It's so hard because we don't produce our own clothes. So that's why I'm very wary of what type of terms we use, because it's impossible for me to go have a look at every single brand that we sell and check their production. And even if they're certified as per our criteria, like how long ago was it certified? Did someone check it? You know, there's a lot of things that come into place. And also like how far down you go back into the production line because oftentimes it's for their own production, but then where did they buy the fabric? Where did it come from? How has it grown? Like there's no transparency there.
Jad: So I can't say we’re the ethical kids fashion, because I have no transparency on that and we're still a small startup. So I'm hoping that with time and with the more power that we gain, let's say with our vendors, that we'll be able to influence and get more information on these processes with time. And also with time there's more and more tools that come with transparency and studying the supply chain, which are really interesting too. So I'm really hoping that in the next few years, we'll be able to have a better view on those. But for now what I can say and what I can control is when stuff comes back, I can know if it holds through time and I can know which fabric is good, which fabric is good to reuse and then readjust our offering based on our own experience. I can control that nothing goes to landfill. I can control all these things, but going up the chain, I can't say yeah, that cotton, it says it's certified organic, but I didn't go there to check it.
Jad: And I don't know when they were certified and then I don't know who made that fabric, in what type of situation it was made, because even the vendor that sells me the pieces, they buy that fabric some from somewhere else. So there's so many steps on the production line that it's hard as a small business to be able to vouch for all these things, especially when you sell, we have more than 50 brands now that we sell. So our focus really right now is on what we can control and that's durability.
Alice Irene: I want to talk more about fabrics and fibers. Textiles connect our land to our bodies. And I'd love to hear how fabrics and dyes play a part in Mini-Cycle.
Jad: So we only focus on natural fibers because first the manmade fibers oftentimes have a very big impact on it's extraction. So let's say, if we just talk about polyester, you have to extract oil and that produces a lot of emissions. And then also, we want to have natural fibers because we're also thinking about the end of the life of the pieces. So even though we want to avoid landfill, let's say, I don't know, I have this vest and there's holes everywhere. I can't resell it the way it is. And I decide to make like a teddy bear with it. I'm still gonna have scraps from this shirt. So I want to make sure that if it doesn't get recycled, that at least if it ends up in a nature that it's going to be something that won't pollute, that will decompose after six months.
Jad: So plastic might biodegrade, but all the plastic particles stay in the environment. And same thing when our customers wash their pieces. So when we wash polyester, it creates a lot of microplastic in our waterways, and then that's impossible to filter out. So if you start with natural fiber, at least you have some natural products that go back in nature if they end up being wasted, or if there's leakages from how we wash the pieces. So that's kind of our first focus. Then once we've looked at just taking natural fiber. And we look at, like I said, durability. So for instance, bamboo, while there's different ways to make bamboo. So a bamboo rayon is not something that lasts really well. It also pollutes a lot when you produce it.
Jad: So right now, internally, we just don't buy any bamboo, because oftentimes it won't even say how it's made. It's just going to say bamboo. And we don't really want to encourage pieces or brands that are not making their pieces to last, especially because we guarantee to buy back. We find anyways that natural fabrics, the yarn is longer so oftentimes it pills less, it keeps it shape better, it's easier to repair, it's easier to wash, it's easier to destain. And finally, the last point, which I don't advertise a lot, but the skin is the biggest organ we have on our body.
Jad: You have a new born, they were just born. Their skin is super porous. Do you really want to put plastic on their skin as soon as they're born? No. Do you want to put cotton that was full of pesticides on their bodies? Probably not. So there's this whole idea of keeping that natural world around your baby and keeping them safe. We think a lot about what we put inside our bodies, but what we put on our skin is also very important. So thinking about natural dyes and noble fibers that are natural and not dangerous for the skin.
Alice Irene: It's interesting. There's been so much awareness around food and the impact with our health and the environment, but that same connection with fashion is not been made yet.
Jad: No, exactly. I feel like more and more people are aware of it. If you look at the generations like millennials and gen Z, they're much more aware than generations that come before. I mean, there's a big difference. And I see it more and more in our customers. They're asking for specific things and they they're very aware as to what the consume and what they put on their children. They see their children as an extension of them. So they're not interested anymore in buying like 50 plastic body suits from Old Navy. You know, that's not the idea anymore. It's changing slowly, but it's changing.
Alice Irene: Your children are growing, as you mentioned. And like I mentioned, I have three young children and when I hear about net zero targets or just the future in general, 2030, 2050. I personally feel very fearful. It's hard to think about what that year will look like for them when I think what age they will be – still so young. Do you think with what you're doing, that your children are learning from what you're doing and do you think of their future? What comes up for you when you think about them in 20 years?
Jad: Well, I do think that you influence your kids by much more by what you do than what you say, right? So theu really look at you and analyze you and learn from you. They understand Mini-Cycle, they are proud of it and they love it. So there'll be the first one to advertise for me when we're talking to people. Obviously they're still young, so they probably don't understand all the intricacies, but they're very much aware of climate change and resource depletion. And I feel like in some way, sometimes I feel bad for them because it's a heavy burden to carry. And I know more and more young people have this like environmental anxiety because they don't know what the future going to hold.
Jad: And it doesn't seem like the present generations are really trying hard enough to make a difference to sustain our future on this planet. So for me too, that worries me a lot. And sometimes I try to teach them or teach anyone for that matter is that oftentimes people think that their little gesture doesn't change anything, but really as a whole, we can make a difference. So if everyone thinks the same way, we're never going to get anywhere. I think it really has to come from all sphere of society, whether it's government putting in stricter policies or businesses really stepping up and offering real services and products that do not kill our planet, kill our environment. And also customers, they have power in the way that they purchase and the way that they consume. So they're sending a message.
Jad: I think the generations like your kids and my kids, they're very exposed to it. And they're going to be very careful and they'll be the game changers I think. They'll start the businesses that no one has had the guts to start and they will help change the way that we see the world as it is right now. You know, alleviate poverty, probably at some point eating meat's going to be something of the past. So, you know, there's going to be a lot of things that are going to change. It's hard for me to know what's going to happen in the future but I really do think that they're going to be agents of change and just the way they're being taught at school and being exposed to different industries that are trying to help the way we're living on this planet.
Alice Irene: They will certainly be courageous. The times will demand it of them. And I like what you were saying, we're all parts of this whole right. And all of us need to use everything at our disposal. So many different ways, everyone with their own role and their own influence in one whole.
Jad: Yeah. I don't think it's about being perfect. I don't think it's about like being perfectly zero waste or living your life based on the circularity of ecosystems. But I think it's really important to ask yourself questions. When you throw something in the garbage that's going somewhere, it's not just, you throw it away. So as soon as you start asking yourself the question, it becomes like a heavier burden to carry but you're not blinded anymore. And you're trying your best to make the best decisions as you can, and when you don't ask yourself any questions, it's very easy to forget about it all, and to make the wrong decisions.
Jad: At least if you make the wrong decision, you know you're doing it and you might want to improve with time on how you made those decisions in your life. But yeah, I feel like the questioning part is very important. Being analytical with how we evolve in this world and every system that we use in our everyday life. It's kind of like an awakening in some ways of understanding how society works and how you can help it be better.
Alice Irene: We started talking about generations at the beginning of this conversation, you as a child and the previous generations in that forest that you talked about. I wanted to ask if there is anything around generations that you wanted to add? So either anything from past generations that have influenced you and what you're doing, and then how that extends to future generations, which is something that you write about on your website as well, passing this on for future generations.
Jad: So my great grandparents and all great grandparents, they were pretty much about reusing, you know, and using as little as possible. Their livelihoods relied on the local. And then there was industrialization and the internet, and all of a sudden you couldbuy things from across the world and have access to all these foods and products from everywhere. So I feel like now there's a movement to rethink that industrialization and to really acknowledge that we don't need to consume as much. We can repair things, we can reuse things and we can encourage the local economy. And that's already, I feel like a step forward and I feel like this generation and the ones to come are really focused on that.
Jad: And so what I teach in Strategies for Sustainability is that there's two mindsets for solutions for sustainability. There's like the ecotopian and the technofix. So we could, ecotopian is someone really going back to the land and having those local economies preparing, making handcrafting things and living a small life within your community with as little impact as possible and being self-sufficient, off the grid. And then you have these techofix, which the idea is, oh no, we're depleting the ozone, so let's put something in the atmosphere to protect us from the sun or let's try to put windmills everywhere to create renewable energy and then distribute that energy at large. So bigger systems, bigger solutions.
Jad: I really think it's going to be a mix of both. I don't think societies will want to go back in time and live by the land and be self-sufficient. Some will and some are doing it, but I don't think it's going to stick with most people. And at the same time, I don't think that technology can solve all issues, especially if we continue growing as a population and consuming as much as we do. So there's going to have to be a bit of both.
Jad: Going back to your question, looking at past generation is really learning from the ways that they were doing by reusing and consuming little and interacting in their local economy. In the future, for sure there's going to be new technologies that are going to help us be more sustainable. But I do think that with the way that population is growing and the demand and the pressure for natural resources is going, there's going to have to be an idea of localization and consuming as close as possible from our homes. So really decentralizing the resources that we use.
Alice Irene: That was today's episode of Reseed. I'd love to hear what you thought about our conversation. Reseed is created on unceded Algonquin land. Thank you to this place. Thank you to Rebecca Ryvola for podcast cover art and Teghan Acres for being an outside eye. And thank you for listening. Together let's plant the seeds that transform us from being takers to caretakers.