People find ways to live more lightly on Earth

Growing numbers of people in Eugene and elsewhere in the Northwest are choosing to downsize their material needs and build local ecological culture.

Grass is being traded for garden space. Regional food security is generating a sharp upturn in interest. There are several buy-local campaigns around town. A Eugene nonprofit offers grants to support local sustainability initiatives. Networks of mutual assistance for agriculture, small business, barter and community service are emerging in Pleasant Hill, Cottage Grove, Marcola, Dexter and Brownsville.

Several reasons can account for much of this upsurge of interest in cultural, economic and lifestyle alternatives. One involves oil. Growing concern about stability in the Middle East, disruptions in supply elsewhere and peak oil are leading people to choose to live simpler lives and take care of needs closer to home as a means of reducing their dependence on a commodity and an economy that are becoming increasingly vulnerable.

Consensus is near complete that human activity is changing our climate and that profound social, economic and political disruptions will follow. Climate change motivates many people to simplify and downsize their lifestyles to reduce their contribution to the causes, and limit their exposure to the effects, of those disruptions.

Register-Guard (Oregon)