Bottled water is just the beginning. I'm not sure how widespread this phenomenon is, but around here there has been quite a bit of talk about giving up on bottled water since it is wasteful and we have plenty of it locally at our taps. For a long time I resisted bottled water, but eventually gave in and now I'm used to its flavourless charm. (Let's not talk about the fact that I actually prefer aqua minerale frizzante from the other side of the planet...).

Update: Anil Dash has a recent post on the evils of bottled water.

In any case, I'm all for going local, and willing to make the effort. This weekend we're off to get a simple Brita jug to see if it will turn the tap water into something drinkable (from a taste perspective: I'm pretty sure there is nothing wrong with it). We'll see how that goes.

What I would like to see, and am still waiting for, is for the same mentality and fervour that is brought to the bottled water issue be brought to other products in our economy. Take, for example, the news story I came across this morning that most of the apple juice from concentrate sold in the US comes from China. Both the US and Canada produce enough apples that we should have no problem getting apple juice from local sources. Importing apple concentrate from China surely takes more energy then acquiring it from local sources. Buying local would also help keep the money and the jobs in our countries.

A combination of factors has made it so that the only thing people (meaning the people making the product as well as those who purchase it) can see is the cost. That is the direct impact, and even in today's over-educated, over-informed society, we seem unable to see past the now to consider the real future. This isn't by accident: corporate advertising and government propaganda work hard at focusing our attention on the fleeting present, linking our twitch-reactions through a preposterous chain of causality to a conjured future that will never happen. Resistance, while not futile, is very hard.