rachel wong

What cultivated your interest in environmental sustainability? Are there any specific events/people that fuelled your passion?

I started off being interested in food specifically and farming in itself was because Evelyn, Javen and Suki (friends of Rachel) had a HCCRI kind of conference, and one of the keynote speakers was Bjorn Low from Edible Garden City. He framed farming as something that can be very community-centric and can involve a lot of different vulnerable groups and serve them, such as the elderly, those with intellectual disabilities, the differently abled… all these different communities can still participate and join in in the act of farming, and there are mental health benefits when working with food.

 

He talked about environmental sustainability, which I had previously been briefly exposed to because my sister had a “no-plastic” phase and hence I was exposed to the issues over dinner. While it was not pivotal, this was one of the factors which led to my passion for environmental sustainability over the years.

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Initially, it was the intersectionality that drew me in; there is the farming, social work aspect where we can work with different vulnerable groups, the sustainability aspect which is very big for me, and also the element of being able to do place-making (which I was only exposed to later on in my journey) which drew me in a lot. How can we build spaces that can build and sustain communities? How do we make spaces more livable? I think farming has a lot of potential in that, and it makes me grow to like it more and more.

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I like to identify more with the nature and biodiversity side instead of the sustainability side; it is not like a distinction has to be drawn but I find myself more attracted to the biodiversity crisis and how food affects that, rather than more of the sustainability and the climate side, which would touch on issues of waste and emissions. I am more concerned with agroecology, agrobiodiversity and farming as a whole and as an industry, it’s a lot more stuff like land clearing — not so much because land clearing releases a lot of emissions (which it definitely does), but more on how land clearing destroys habitats, and that love for life that I see as creation is a lot flowed by my faith (my faith is Christianity and there is this connection on how we express and limit our love). So to me, the love should be extended to all of God’s creations, and living in harmony with non-human life as well. My love for biodiversity and my interest in the cause is also a pretty natural extension of my Christian faith. This is also how I started my journey in advocating for environmental sustainability.

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What is one thing you think every youth should practise in their daily life to impact the environment?

I think there’s a lot of awareness on the difference between systematic change and individual change, and the former is often more effective in driving real impact. The way I like to see individual action is less about making a difference but more about doing what’s right. For example, if I believe very strongly that shein as a brand is not ethical and not sustainable, and all the other controversial implications that come with the brand, I as a consumer and a human, will not support that brand. I ultimately agree that individual actions may not make that big of a difference, but it is more about doing what’s right.

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Regarding eating specifically, there is a lot of intersectionality between public health and sustainability. There is this whole paradigm shift in the past 60 years where we start to consume more meat, dairy and the like; there is also the nutrition transition in the last 60 years which I learned about fairly recently, which is about all the hidden tsunamis that come about our way of eating. I really like Greendot’s slogan: “Every time you eat is a chance to nourish your body”.

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So in terms of what every youth should do, it would be to consume less meat and less dairy, but to me it is more to nourish our body better, while also impacting the environment.

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Seeing that you enlighten your followers on how our food choices impact the soil and our carbon emissions, what is something you hope to see in 10 years?

I started to see myself sharing about the impact of food choices more as general education than trying to assert that food choices do impact the soil and carbon emissions. Ultimately, one person choosing to change their diet, even if it is widespread, is going to drive very minimal change. However, I hope that in 10 years’ time, the information or awareness of how food is linked to sustainability and how our food is produced will become more mainstream. I hope that we as consumers will be more connected to the food that we eat, and the food sources, and the people it affects, and the land it affects and all these kinds of factors. The rural versus urban divide is a very big thing, and if we don’t consciously educate ourselves it will be very easy to destroy other peoples’ lands, other peoples’ natural environments and other peoples’ livelihoods with the choices we make, all the while being ignorant of the full impacts. In 10 years, I hope that these things will be more mainstream and people are more aware of it (like how people are more aware of Shein and how damaging their processes are)

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Are there any types of volunteer work or volunteering organisations that you would encourage youths to engage in to positively impact our earth? What do you think should be done to ensure that current future generations will prioritise our environment? Also, environmentalism is often a very niche field in volunteerism. How do you suggest that youths contribute to this cause?

As someone who is just starting out being interested in the field, the best thing is to educate yourself, to shift your mindset, because every choice that we make in terms of food or other things does leave an impact to the environment, to the people making the product, to nature, climate, waste, pollution and more. Everyone in the field of environmentalism does have an area that moves them a bit more. For example, I feel very strongly about nature, but someone else may feel very strongly about climate. Maybe plugging into that space, being open and putting the effort to be more connected to your sources of the things you consume, and eventually finding the area of environmentalism that moves you and will drive you to make change in your actions or serve in some capacity in that environmentalism field might be the best way to start out. I wouldn’t suggest jumping straight into it, but more of being receptive and trying to learn more about it as a consumer. From then on, there are low hanging fruits such as tree planting, beach clean-ups, going for nature guided walks are quite big things. Don’t be in a hurry to serve, but let the service opportunities come to you slowly, as you plug into the space and learn about it more. That would be more constructive.

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I’m currently with LepakInSG and Singapore Youth Voices for Biodiversity, but those aren’t really “service” oriented organisations in the traditional sense — I’d say tuning in to our work and supporting these advocacy groups might be more impactful than directly “volunteering” with them.

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It goes back to my point about the end goal of this, which for me is making the knowledge or awareness mainstream and getting people to be more connected with their food and its impacts. So rather than volunteering, educating yourself and caring goes a long long way.

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That said, experiences do get people so much more involved with causes. I really love what Ground-Up Initiative (GUI) is doing.

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I would love to see people go for guided nature walks or intertidal explorations too — in some sense, you’re spending time and effort appreciating and learning about nature, which might be the best way to “volunteer” with nature (it leads to a whole bunch of other stuff too, and you’ll discover ways to “serve” as you plug into the space)!

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I also really really love tree planting initiatives, though I’d caution against seeing it as doing something for nature (because 1 million trees will be planted whether we as citizens plant or not), but more as an opportunity to be exposed to and learn about nature! NParks is the biggest organiser for tree planting so check out their website! I volunteer with them as a facilitator too, which is another thing people can look into.

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Clean-ups are also great, though I’m not in that space as much. Organisations doing this would be #EastCoastBeachPlan (join their Telegram chat and join others’ cleanups), Stridy (log your own cleanups) and Green Nudge.