Ravi's Summer Blog
Hi!
My name is Ravi Gopinathan, and I am a highschool student at Canyon Crest Academy in San Diego, California. I will be co-president of the CCA Ecoclub this year, an environmental club on campus that promotes sustainability. One of the biggest things I’m doing this summer is continuing my volunteering with political campaigns by calling voters and getting hands on experience in sustainability. Currently, I have volunteered for over 5 different political campaigns since the 2016 election. I believe that it is very important to involve the community and ask the voters what their thoughts are and what questions they might have. I feel that through grassroots activists, like myself, the candidates I have volunteered for were able to successfully run their campaigns.
From the phone interviews I conduct, I feel that one of the biggest concerns people have nowadays is climate change and how it affects us as a human race. It is interesting to see how the candidates I volunteer for cover this important topic. Not only do government policies and international corporations play a huge role in climate, but consumer advocacy and eco-friendly businesses are important elements as well. Businesses and, eventually, every consumer have the power to make decisions that affect the planet, starting from energy sources and over established recycling policies in their offices to product packaging. Consumers will judge businesses by their ecological footprint. Although governments are able to step in and create regulations that restrict what businesses are allowed to do, in a globalized world and world wide competition, it is really up to the businesses of how much they are willing and able to shift their environmental practices from the status quo to sustainability.
Thanks to the push for climate action and environmental justice, social businesses have been created that change the way corporations are thought of. Big name tech companies are buying carbon credits to make a difference in energy consumption and are now sourcing 100% of their energy from renewable energies. A search engine company is changing the way we think about online searching by donating 10% of their net income to plant trees in places where forests have disappeared (www.Ecosia.org). A company in Australia creates energy not from the gravity of flowing water or tides, but from the way waves move up and down in the ocean. The clean energy industry has paved the way for energy companies to find new ways to capture, store and distribute energy.
The fight is not over though; we still have plenty of work to do! Social businesses like Shore Buddies (www.shore-buddies.com) and others that source their products from environmentally sustainable resources are making a difference and giving us consumer options from which resources we want to buy. Raising consumer awareness increases the demand for such products and eventually will push the old fashioned businesses aside. Businesses and consumers are the ones that have the power to take the lead in climate action. I truly believe that the day will come when most businesses will promote their environmental practices as part of their branding, because we as the consumer have to make the decision who we trust with our money. We will be able to demand that change and that the future will only be profitable and lucrative for businesses that go green to gain and keep customers.
That’s why I’m interning at Shore Buddies this summer. I think social and environmental businesses are at the front of the fight against climate change and I hope to be a part of one that succeeds. I am excited for my summer internship and will report from field trips with Shore Buddies as well as current environmental topics.
Stay tuned!
For the future generations,
Ravi