The reliance on global supply chains has created a brittle, less resilient economy, particularly in island nations. Disruptions from climate (floods, hurricanes, heat waves …), political instability (wars, revolutions), and health (covid-19) cause major disruptions to centralized distribution that is reliant on cargo ships that significantly contribute to global climate change and acidification. Shortages in the food supply cause not just hardship but can lead to starvation.
“A more local and therefore more resilient economy is one in which people feel they have more of a stake in production and distribution as well as consumption; one in which they have more knowledge of where their goods come from and what happens to them at the end of their lifecycle.”
Richard Heinberg —Think Resilience from the Post Carbon Institute
When land investment is driven by short-term profit (single-family housing, shopping malls, warehouses, and golf courses), nature conservation and local farms are not valued. Instead, the land becomes brittle as forests are removed, changing local climates and causing desertification.
These paintings are on lottery tickets discarded when they are discovered to be … unlucky. The concept of the lottery is where our problems (economic, climate, personal) will all be erased the moment we get lucky and win a random contest heavily weighted against the individual. We cannot solve our climate crisis by hoping for a miracle, either.
