BoomerGirl Diary

Environmental activist and writer Diane MacEachern is calling on women to, quite literally, change the world.

Why women?

“Women spend 85 cents of every dollar in the marketplace,” Diane says. “We have more consumer clout in the United States …than the entire economy of Japan. And when you look at all the work that needs to be done to reduce pollution and protect habitat, and control air and water quality, all of those things are affected by consumer purchases.”

That’s why Diane wrote “Big Green Purse: Use Your Spending Power to Create a Cleaner, Greener World” and founded BigGreenPurse.com. She hopes to influence female power consumers to speak loud and clear to manufacturers, with their pocketbooks, that women want a greener, cleaner world — for themselves, their children and generations to come.

But MacEachern isn’t just talking about household purchases. Today, more than 50% of women are managing budgets for corporate America and most volunteer organizations are run - you guessed it - by women.

“Every single purchase we make has an environmental impact because the making of things uses energy and water and resources, and so on,” Diane explains. “So at home, at work, where we volunteer, where we recreate - all of those purchases combined give us enormous power to get the world we want.”

Diane outlines seven “Big Green Purse” shopping principles in the beginning of the book:

(1) Buy less

(2) Read the label

(3) Support sustainable standards

(4) Look for third-party verification

(5) Choose fewer ingredients

(6) Pick less packaging

(7) Buy local

The remaining chapters are dedicated to helping consumers adhere to those principles with practical tips, earth-friendly brand suggestions and Web resources. (Listen to our podcast with Diane for explanations of each principle.)

As controversy rages about the rate of global warming or the lack of absolute scientific evidence with regards to some aspects of environmental decline, Diane points to The Precautionary Principle and its four tenets as the foundation of her conviction.

(1) Pay attention to early warnings: Act BEFORE we get hurt

(2) Shift “Burden of proof” from us and the planet to manufacturers and producers

(3) Develop safe alternatives to toxic substances and activities

(4) Involve the public in decision making.

“The Precautionary Principle says prevent a problem before it happens,” MacEachern says. “My mother always told me ‘an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.’ And that is so true when it comes to the environment. We really know a lot now about the symptoms of the problems that we’re dealing with. And we may not completely understand the causes but we know enough to move towards the solution.”