Christmas Tree What Kind?

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This shopping mall decorates the tree with greeting cards.

The Christmas tree. Cut or from a box? Either way, it is bad news for the environment. Christmas is good news for places that grow them. There are bank loans and workers to be paid. This is not the only industry that invests year-round resources, for Christmas. We tend to concentrate on gifts and turkeys and forget about the whole sub-industry.  

Good old Hollywood and Oprah have always cashed in, by making films especially for Christmas. Studios also release what they think will be blockbusters at this time. Imagine the shock, when Black Panther, the Marvel film directed by Ryan Coogler became a blockbuster.  It was released in February 2018, because they didn’t think a black film was capable of such success, if released before Christmas.

Whether it is a movie or home tree, growing trees only to cut them for one day, is bad for the environment because trees are the winter coat for the soil. After Christmas, they sit in garbage dumps with champagne and whisky bottles and old television sets, because we got plasma T.V.s for Christmas.

Synthetic trees are not an alternative because we take them out from the box, decorate them, take a photo, post it on social media and haul them to the garbage afterwards. Families that are conscious of climate change, pack them, to be resurrected next Christmas.

Nonqaba waka Msimang

Executive Blogger

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