SmallGovTimes.com

By: Neal Boortz | Published on 11/27/07    

Oregon seems to have an obsession with Christmas trees. That might be because Oregon is the top Christmas tree producer in the country ... but where would we be without mixing environmentalists and Christmas.

Oregon growers have created a system to identify trees grown under specific environmental standards. So this means that there actually exists a Coalition of Environmentally Conscious Growers. This year, for the first time, more than 200,000 tags will hang on Christmas trees, which will indicate that the trees were farmed by the coalition's standards. (No telling if "coalition-friendly" trees are more expensive or not.)

In order to pass the Conscious Growers' Environmentally-friendly standards, a farm must be inspected to make sure that it meets certain standards for managing wetlands, nutrients and pests. Water and soil conservations are also reviewed, as well as biodiversity and worker safety efforts. They want to make sure that the Christmas tree farms aren't using excessive pesticides and contributing to erosion.

Sadly, only a handful of retailers will be selling the "safe" trees. It seems they just don't have time to fulfill the mandate of educating consumers about the difference between a coalition "safe" tree and a regular Christmas tree.

So ... now we have green green Christmas trees.

Original URL:
http://www.smallgovtimes.com/story/07nov27.oregon.trees/index.html