If I didn’t know any better I would think the idea of sustainability was relatively new and grew in popularity as a response to the rise of consumerism and fast fashion. Growing up in a Jamaican household, it was common to see eco-friendly practices at home; the bunches of plastic grocery bags under the kitchen sink, adding water to the dish soap to make it last longer and hand-washed clothing set hung to dry as soon as the sun came out. I spent much of my early teenage years with a closet filled with mainly clothing for home and school, when I needed something semi-formal to wear to an event or church, my mother would often find something in her closet that she could pin on me.
Fast-forward to 2025 and the concept of sustainability feels quite foreign. It appears that in order to meet the standard of “sustainable living” you need a growing collection of $1 reusable grocery bags and a weekly trip to the farmers market. The concept of sustainability was being repackaged and resold to me, and as a result I was losing the recipes for true sustainable efforts. According to a Bain & Company survey, nearly half of all developed-market consumers believe that living sustainably is too expensive. I realized that in order to participate I didn’t need to buy into trends-I needed to reconnect with the resourcefulness that was already woven into my heritage.
Looking back further at many of the cultural practices that developed as a result of slavery, it’s very clear that sustainability wasn’t a performance, it was a necessity. During Jamaica’s colonial era, using the less desirable cuts of meat like oxtail and liver was necessary to get your protein. If you wanted to clean your space but had no access to cleaning materials you’d make a broom using the long grass from unused fields. Though this colonial era ended in 1962, I couldn’t help but notice the theme of foreign powers trying to control prime land and resources is still prevalent. The politics surrounding the Beach Control Act of 1956, which prevents locals from accessing one of Jamaica’s greatest natural resources, their beaches.
