Dialogue: Core values under threat from the global economy

Our traditional values can still form the heart of a
modern nation founded on sustainability, justice and participation, says Green Party co-leader JEANETTE FITZSIMONS.

Bare feet on the beach. Surfing. Bush and mountains. Fishing, picking mushrooms or blackberries.

The hospital takes you without checking your insurance papers. Civil servants don't take bribes and you don't spend long in prison without a trial. No fancy formalities and you don't have to dress for dinner.

Innovation - we can still do anything with No 8 wire - and, as the world's social laboratory, we led with votes for women and social security. Perhaps that's because we believe in a fair go for the underdog.

We push our limits, going beyond the ordinary in sport, the arts, exploring and research.

These are unmistakably New Zealand common core values. To those who have rejected them for a world dominated by purely commercial considerations, they now sound quaint and unsophisticated. But they are still widely accepted and can form the core of a modern nation founded on sustainability, justice and participation.

They will serve us well in the future because other peoples value them, too.

Bare feet on the beach are not only at the heart and soul of New Zealand life, but the starting point for how we earn our living in the world.

Food is still our biggest export and the food the world is crying out for - and willing to pay for - is natural, uncontaminated, preferably organic and certainly free of genetic engineering. New Zealand could provide it.

Increasingly, the world will pay for timber products not sourced from old-growth forests but from sustainably managed plantations - provided they are certified grown in an environmentally sound way.

Tourists don't want to see the same things here as they see elsewhere. They want a holiday with a difference. They want to see New Zealand culture, to meet interesting and creative people, to be part of the "clean, green" environment, and to taste its products - fresh food and wine.

But the core values that are vital to New Zealanders' sense of themselves and their attraction for outsiders are under threat from the values, technologies and lifestyles of the global economy.

Our own indigenous New Zealand experience is in danger of being swamped by a pre-packaged multinational culture. Our food is threatened by genetic engineering, pesticides, antibiotics and growth hormones.

Ozone depletion from the aerosols and refrigerants we used 20 years ago is forcing today's children to cover up from neck to knees at the beach. Our vaunted "egalitarian society" is being destroyed by global economic competition driving the increasing gap between rich and poor and sending New Zealand jobs overseas.

The rules of the global economy even threaten our national sovereignty. Our food standards are set by a transtasman authority with little if any accountability to New Zealand. Food labelling, environmental standards, even governments wanting to buy local can be seen as against the rules of the World Trade Organisation - as barriers in the way of free trade, even if that trade is potentially hazardous or undesirable for its people.

The great contradiction is that our industrial way of life - the "lifestyles" we choose - is threatening the core values most of us still hold dear. Something has to change.

The environment cannot be put in a separate box from the economy. Because it is the basis for all life it is also the basis for the economy. If we are to survive with a reasonable quality of life, sustainability must be at the heart of everything we do.

It isn't rocket science. We know how to use energy and all other resources much more efficiently to get more value and less waste.

Cleaner production and zero waste are becoming familiar terms in business. We still have a long way to go to put that knowledge into practice. But the companies that have gone furthest have found it very profitable. There are simply better things to spend scarce dollars on than wasted resources and pollution.

The Dow Jones has a special sustainability index, a group of companies which represent the best environmental practice in their fields. They consistently outperform the rest.

We can blend a green economy and a knowledge economy - and there are jobs to be developed in both areas. Sustainability, energy efficiency, renewable energy, zero waste technologies, organic farming - all must be underpinned by sound science and research and much of that knowledge is in demand around the world.

New Zealand has experience in small-scale applications that are particularly suited to these technologies. That's part of what we Greens mean by an eco-nation.

It also recognises that endless efforts to meet our needs with more and more material consumption will doom both ourselves and our planet.

There can be no excuse for poverty and deprivation in a country with our resources, but once we've got a decent roof over our heads and food on the table, more and more material goods don't meet our most fundamental needs. Human relationships must be nurtured as well.

Societies are often described in terms of rights and responsibilities. We would see it rather in terms of relationships. There is a big difference.

Rights are about taking the maximum and responsibilities are about doing the minimum. Relationships are mutual and evolving. They are full of surprise, delight and frustration. You have to work at them, and you get back in proportion to what you put in.

To make progress as a nation we need to work at our relationships with each other, with other nations, with future generations and with nature and other species.

Successful relationships are based on respect rather than dominance or subservience. Respect would go a long way in race relations, and sustainability may be impossible without respect for nature.

* Tomorrow: National Party leader Jenny Shipley.

Herald Online feature: Common core values

We invite to you to contribute to the debate on core values. E-mail dialogue@herald.co.nz.