Speaker 1: Hudson River Radio dot com. It beats listening to nothing.
Speaker 2: My goodness, it's being Frank, where the only way to
Speaker 2: be is Frank. Hello everyone, and welcome to being Frank Ware.
Speaker 2: The only way to be is Frank. I'm your host,
Speaker 2: Frank Mbuono, and I'd like to thank you for joining
Speaker 2: us on what we like to call the Intelligent Conversation Podcast,
Speaker 2: where no conversations out of bounds, in all points of
Speaker 2: view are welcome. You know, we record live to tape.
Speaker 2: I give you the date so you have some context
Speaker 2: and relevance. It is the twenty third of April. Just
Speaker 2: the day before the taping of this episode, we celebrated
Speaker 2: the fifty fifth anniversary of the first Earth Day, and
Speaker 2: I have a strong recollection of it. I was a
Speaker 2: sophomore in high school and remember the excitement it generated.
Speaker 2: There were speeches and events not only around the campus
Speaker 2: but in the country at large. There was a sense
Speaker 2: that it was time to stop the damage we were
Speaker 2: causing to our environment, and that if we worked at it,
Speaker 2: we could build a better future for everyone. And we
Speaker 2: did work at it. Strides were made, while at the
Speaker 2: same time we acknowledged there was still a great deal
Speaker 2: of work to do if we were to truly save
Speaker 2: the planet. Still, one of the things that's always confused
Speaker 2: me then and still does was getting the greater part
Speaker 2: of America to understand the urgency of this issue. While
Speaker 2: we have made gains in cleaning the air and water,
Speaker 2: there is a persistent resistance to the notion that poisons
Speaker 2: remain in our environment that are killing the very planet
Speaker 2: that sustains us. Particularly galling is the notion that some
Speaker 2: people still deny that global warming precipitated by the continuous
Speaker 2: use of fossil fuel is real. It's seen as some
Speaker 2: type of political scan aimed at limiting our personal freedoms.
Speaker 2: This thinking has been exacerbated by an administration that is
Speaker 2: doing everything in its power to dismantle the hard work
Speaker 2: gains we made in protecting the earth. They have begun
Speaker 2: the process of dismantling the EPA aid in many of
Speaker 2: the programs that kept us safe. The President even had
Speaker 2: the country withdrawal from the Paris Climate Cord that would
Speaker 2: have continued the effort to limit worldwide pollution. But what
Speaker 2: can we do well? Our guest took the matter, shall
Speaker 2: we say, personally, and dedicated his life to the cause
Speaker 2: of saving the environment. He left a highly successful career
Speaker 2: in the tech industry to experience life directly in the Amazon,
Speaker 2: one of the most important endangered ecosystems. By traveling there
Speaker 2: and living and learning at his own time and expense,
Speaker 2: that experience transformed him into what a recent article called
Speaker 2: a global toxic avenger. He became an author and advocate,
Speaker 2: creating two very influential and successful organizations dealing with environmental issues,
Speaker 2: especially among poor nations and people. He continues his activism
Speaker 2: and is currently working on another book to save the planet. Please,
Speaker 2: welcome to being Frank for some intelligent conversation, mister Richard Fuller,
Speaker 2: appreciate you. I know you're a busy guy, especially now
Speaker 2: we just finished Earth Day and it's Earth Awareness Month, etc.
Speaker 2: So I'm sure you're busy.
Speaker 1: Well, it was a really delightful introduction frame, Thank you
Speaker 1: so very much.
Speaker 2: Well, it's a pleasure to have you here now. And
Speaker 2: people they've heard you speak a little hint of an accent.
Speaker 2: So that you grew up in Australia. Who what were
Speaker 2: some of your early influencers mentors? Tell us about your
Speaker 2: life there.
Speaker 1: I'm a Melbourne boy, so growing up in Australia as
Speaker 1: an ideal place to be. There's a lot of outdoor
Speaker 1: sports and recreation. It's not dirty at all. It's a
Speaker 1: great fun place. And I grew up through my university
Speaker 1: years and until I was about thirty really just having
Speaker 1: a great time. So it was around that time that
Speaker 1: I started looking at what was going on globally and
Speaker 1: thought maybe I could do something more. And you know,
Speaker 1: there's a there's this guy out there, Buckminster Fuller. Have
Speaker 1: you ever seen his stuff?
Speaker 2: A little bit? Yes, I had, what's certainly in the name, Yes, so.
Speaker 1: I had to, you know, read up on him because
Speaker 1: he's my namesake, though we're not at all related. And
Speaker 1: somewhere in some of his writings he was saying, look,
Speaker 1: you only get one life. How big could you make it?
Speaker 1: What could you do to make it? You know, really
Speaker 1: really as spectacular as possible? And there I was at IBM, enjoying,
Speaker 1: you know, the fruits of making lots of money and
Speaker 1: working in the computer industry, and I thought, Eh, what
Speaker 1: else could I do that would be more fun than this?
Speaker 1: What else could I do that would push it a
Speaker 1: bit further? So that was kind of the start of it.
Speaker 2: Was there any particular epiphany that you can recall, a
Speaker 2: moment you know, people see, you know, feels light bulb
Speaker 2: going off above your head. Was there any a moment
Speaker 2: like that where you made the firm commitment first in
Speaker 2: your mind then physically to do well.
Speaker 1: It was a little bit like that, but it was
Speaker 1: more like a moment of saying, look, you know, becoming
Speaker 1: a senior executive at the white shirt, blue pin striped suit,
Speaker 1: big us company. Ah, that doesn't feel right at all.
Speaker 1: So grab a bottle of wine and sit down the
Speaker 1: kitchen table and start to think of what would be
Speaker 1: a good life. And I just wrote down a few
Speaker 1: things that I thought would be a life worth living,
Speaker 1: and a few things that I really thought I ordered
Speaker 1: to do. So the fun things were. I thought, I
Speaker 1: really wanted to go skiing on the West Coast in
Speaker 1: the Rockies, right, I mean I.
Speaker 2: Have that in my notes. I was going to press
Speaker 2: you on that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Oh you know, I just love skiing and I
Speaker 1: always wanted to see the Rockies. So that was one thing.
Speaker 1: And then another thing I wanted to do was I
Speaker 1: wanted to live in a foreign country and learn to
Speaker 1: speak a different language. You know, something that very common
Speaker 1: for Australians. We love traveling, but I really wanted to
Speaker 1: embed myself somewhere in a different culture and really really
Speaker 1: do that. And then the next thing is I was
Speaker 1: hearing a lot about rainforest depletion, so I'm like, I
Speaker 1: got to find out what's that all about? All the
Speaker 1: Amazon rainforests, burning beef cattle, all that stuff that you
Speaker 1: could It was loud, very loud around this time because
Speaker 1: this is let me see, I was born in nineteen
Speaker 1: sixty so this was nineteen eighty nine more or less.
Speaker 1: So that was something that really sparked my interest. And
Speaker 1: then kind of all of that I thought got summarized.
Speaker 1: I thought, you know, I really want to make a
Speaker 1: difference in the world, at a kind of a global impact.
Speaker 1: I wanted to have impact beyond just the people that
Speaker 1: I met. I wanted to improve people's lives, beyond just
Speaker 1: those that could actually meet and talk to. And so
Speaker 1: it was something strange like that that I felt would
Speaker 1: be really cool to do.
Speaker 2: It's such strange, it's bold. Certainly you mentioned you were
Speaker 2: about thirty years old and without you know, prying olderly personal,
Speaker 2: but were single. What allowed you to be able to
Speaker 2: do that? I mean if you're committed, if you have family,
Speaker 2: and it's difficult to say I'm going to take off
Speaker 2: of the rainforest for six months.
Speaker 1: Yeah, definitely single. So it's that.
Speaker 2: Enables so okay, it was important to understand, but that
Speaker 2: you use that to further something greater than yourself. I
Speaker 2: think it's fair to say, right.
Speaker 1: Oh, you know, you have to be single to do
Speaker 1: you have to be a little bit loco, you have
Speaker 1: to be a little bit out there, maybe a little
Speaker 1: bit crazy stupid too to think that you could do
Speaker 1: things like this, because it's really hard and actually it's
Speaker 1: mostly leads to failure. So you've got to be okay
Speaker 1: with a bit of failure to do this sort of stuff,
Speaker 1: you know.
Speaker 2: I think that's important to bring up, too, rich as
Speaker 2: we get back into our direct conversation about the environment,
Speaker 2: but especially recently, and there were a number of keynote
Speaker 2: speakers at college graduations within the last year or two
Speaker 2: who revised their speeches. You can do anything if you
Speaker 2: put your mind to it, Yes, but then also you
Speaker 2: should be able to encounter failure. No, these things are
Speaker 2: hard to do, so to set realistic goals, go for them,
Speaker 2: but realize at the same time Failure can be a
Speaker 2: big part of it, and you'll fail many times before
Speaker 2: it success. Would you tend to agree with that from
Speaker 2: your experience.
Speaker 1: Oh, absolutely, Frank. I mean it's I mean you look
Speaker 1: at businesses. I think more than half of all businesses
Speaker 1: that have started fail within the first year. And then
Speaker 1: the non off it, well, the contributive side of things.
Speaker 1: It's I think five times harder than business. I've done both.
Speaker 1: I mean, I've started maybe six different businesses and two
Speaker 1: of them have been successful. And I've started, you know,
Speaker 1: quite a few ango processes and really really one and
Speaker 1: then a second has has actually taken off. It's it's
Speaker 1: really tough work, not selling someone a product or or
Speaker 1: a service, but asking people to give their harder money
Speaker 1: up to do something, to do something that you know
Speaker 1: you can you can get their passion and inflamed about.
Speaker 1: It's really tough work to do that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we're going to talk in detail about those two organizations,
Speaker 2: Great Forest and Pure Earth in some detail. But I'm curious,
Speaker 2: what was your first impression. I've never traveled a bit.
Speaker 2: I went to China before it was popular. If it's
Speaker 2: is part there, certainly not to go to China spent
Speaker 2: a certain sense of adventure, but the rainforest seemed so
Speaker 2: far away. What was your impression of it when you
Speaker 2: first got there, Do you remember the first things that
Speaker 2: popped into your mind?
Speaker 1: Being Well, I spent a lot of time there. I
Speaker 1: spent a good part of a year coming backwards and
Speaker 1: forwards to the US and spending a lot of time
Speaker 1: in very remote parts of the rainforest looking to set
Speaker 1: up extractive reserves. There are a kind of national park
Speaker 1: where there's a responsibility given to local inhabitants to self
Speaker 1: enforce the park. So instead of there being rangers, there
Speaker 1: is a local arrangement where people who are extracting materials
Speaker 1: from the rainforest in a way that doesn't cause any damage,
Speaker 1: so they're harvesting rubber or brazil nuts. They're also given
Speaker 1: responsibility to kind of protect the rainforests from from from
Speaker 1: from real serious destruction. So I spent a lot of
Speaker 1: time working on setting those particular reserves in place. And
Speaker 1: I got to tell you, I call it the triple
Speaker 1: one hundreds. It's one hundred percent humidity, one hundred percent
Speaker 1: of the time, one hundred percent. I've forgotten what the
Speaker 1: third one is. It's just hot. Oh, it's one hundred
Speaker 1: degrees one hundred percent humidity one hundred percent of the time.
Speaker 1: It's just miserable, you know. And you feel so small too,
Speaker 1: because there's so much insect life around you, not many
Speaker 1: big creatures. You don't see them. Occasionally there'll be a
Speaker 1: wild boar that will charge somewhere off in the distance,
Speaker 1: and there's some quite a lot of birds and bird life,
Speaker 1: but mostly it's insects, and you know things that you
Speaker 1: sit on a log next to a stream you've just
Speaker 1: traveled for six hours, and you look down and there's
Speaker 1: like ten different types of ants and you know for
Speaker 1: sure that nine of them have never been classified or
Speaker 1: reviewed by science. And they're not crawling over you and
Speaker 1: biting you.
Speaker 2: So sounds lovel that's not great. Oh yeah, it makes
Speaker 2: everybody want to go. But that leads us to the
Speaker 2: next question, why is all of that important? Why do again?
Speaker 2: Part of my job is to play with the devil's advocate,
Speaker 2: So keep that in mind. Why should we save a
Speaker 2: place like.
Speaker 1: Oh, you know that already, but they don't want to
Speaker 1: hear me say that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, you're supposed to hear you say that.
Speaker 1: You know, it's an enormous amount of biodiversity that's there.
Speaker 1: The more important is weather control. Weather management. There's a
Speaker 1: huge amount of carbon that's tied up there, and once
Speaker 1: you start to cut it down, it just shifts local
Speaker 1: and global weather pattern is such an enormous way, So
Speaker 1: it's a critical it's a critical part of the global
Speaker 1: global ecosystems.
Speaker 2: Why do you think people here, particularly Americans. I can't
Speaker 2: speak for others around the world, but it seems to
Speaker 2: be fairly common to make the connection that all these
Speaker 2: things are connected, that the changing weather, et cetera is
Speaker 2: In other words, damage in a far away exotic place
Speaker 2: like the rainforest has direct effects if someone like us
Speaker 2: living in night you're a Nayakar as well, now affects
Speaker 2: us here in nayak People have a difficulty making that connection,
Speaker 2: or many people do. Obviously we do, that's why we're here.
Speaker 2: But as I said in my intro, there's this constant resistance.
Speaker 2: It's a man made thing. It's not happening, it's not real.
Speaker 2: Why Why do so many people have so much difficulty
Speaker 2: making that connection.
Speaker 1: That's a good question, Frank, I really have no idea,
Speaker 1: and I but the thing is, it's such a long
Speaker 1: distance away. We all think about our neighborhoods and our
Speaker 1: family and things that are miles away that are filled
Speaker 1: with insects. They don't seem that exciting. I don't blame
Speaker 1: people for not getting that excited. But it's not necessary
Speaker 1: for everyone to be worried about the destruction of the
Speaker 1: Amazon rainforest. It's just literally not necessary. It's perfectly okay
Speaker 1: that there are some people who do who can go
Speaker 1: and do something about it and do it for the
Speaker 1: public good, for the general public. I don't feel that
Speaker 1: we need to have everyone in the US have a
Speaker 1: light bulb switch on and say, oh my goodness, you
Speaker 1: know I've got to do A and B and C.
Speaker 1: It's fine, give them, give everyone their voice.
Speaker 2: Let's talk about the organizations. The two successful ones that
Speaker 2: you that you created are the first one, great idea,
Speaker 2: Great Forest about recycle recycling in large companies. What was
Speaker 2: the germ for that idea and how did you make
Speaker 2: that happen? Well?
Speaker 1: I I was in the rainforest, working with local organizations,
Speaker 1: local village people along different rivers in the northern part
Speaker 1: of the Amazon, on the on the Rio Puruche and
Speaker 1: the Rio Jurroa and there were a lot of people
Speaker 1: who didn't really want these extracted reserves to get set up,
Speaker 1: and they were people who were pretty wealthy, had a
Speaker 1: lot of say over local politics, but not over the
Speaker 1: the federal level politics. So my mandate I was working
Speaker 1: there with the United Nations Environment Program for the Ministry
Speaker 1: for the Environment at the federal level, but quietly doing
Speaker 1: this without really interacting with the state or the town
Speaker 1: municipalities who were very keen to see economic development, which
Speaker 1: meant cutting down the rainforest. They had a particular way
Speaker 1: of showing their dissatisfaction, which involved a cult revolver and
Speaker 1: paying a guy to go out and whack you. And
Speaker 1: the going rate was dependent on how how highly placed
Speaker 1: you were. But you could, you know, you could kill
Speaker 1: a mayor for maybe a couple of thousand dollars and
Speaker 1: a peasant for like a couple of hundred dollars. So
Speaker 1: someone put a contract out on me. Wow, yeah, it's
Speaker 1: in my book, Frank, you should read it. You love it.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, I'm loving it now. Movie material based on
Speaker 2: a true story. It was really down personally.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so we were I was in a restaurant and
Speaker 1: the group of people who were kind of we were
Speaker 1: kind of working together and uh uh, a guy, the
Speaker 1: chef comes out of the restaurant and and sus speaking
Speaker 1: very spot fast and Portuguese, says get out of here,
Speaker 1: get out of here. And we raced out through the
Speaker 1: kitchen and they pushed my head down in the back
Speaker 1: seats so no one could see me because I was
Speaker 1: the white Australian, for God's sake, tall and large and
Speaker 1: you know, in the middle of what's a much smaller
Speaker 1: body Swadi kind.
Speaker 2: Of everything there, everything they're not.
Speaker 1: So these guys came in through the main door and
Speaker 1: started shooting out all of the windows and saying, where
Speaker 1: is the Australian from from the United Nations? You know,
Speaker 1: from and organized us, you know United. So so we
Speaker 1: I grabbed my stuff and I raced down to the
Speaker 1: to the local airport and found a guy who charted
Speaker 1: me in his one seventy two Assessina one seventy two,
Speaker 1: and I just paid him to get me the heck
Speaker 1: out of town, get out of Dodge.
Speaker 2: We're talking filmy, I want the rights to this. We're
Speaker 2: on one record right here, but please continue with this
Speaker 2: great story.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so we got in this really cranky old aeroplane
Speaker 1: and and shot away, and they took me down from
Speaker 1: this local town in heil Bronco, I think it was,
Speaker 1: and then to a place that had a regular serviced
Speaker 1: a regular flight every day, going back to the de
Speaker 1: Rio de Janeiro. And I waited a few hours and
Speaker 1: jumped on that and ended that back in Rio, and
Speaker 1: then I looked for the first flight to get me
Speaker 1: to the US and ended up in Miami. So yeah,
Speaker 1: it was pretty it was pretty intense. And then so
Speaker 1: I couldn't. I had had done a whole bunch of
Speaker 1: planning and created a whole bunch of extractive reserves and
Speaker 1: plans and things, and and I sent them all off
Speaker 1: to the to the minister, and most of them actually
Speaker 1: got created. So there's a lot of area under park
Speaker 1: as a result of all this work, but none of
Speaker 1: it with any you know, credit to me at all,
Speaker 1: because the other thing that they did was they put
Speaker 1: out a rumor that I had done something terrible to
Speaker 1: a young boy. You can imagine, you know. So the
Speaker 1: minister wanted nothing to do with me, No one wanted
Speaker 1: to return my call. Was I was just persona non grata.
Speaker 1: And this whole year of work was like you know,
Speaker 1: and I spent on my own money too, So I
Speaker 1: was proke in New York.
Speaker 2: With a contract on your head.
Speaker 1: No, don't go back to break but they would they wouldn't.
Speaker 2: Follow you from the rainforest necessarily, not these guys.
Speaker 1: You know how they would prove that they've got you.
Speaker 1: They would cut off your ear and give it to
Speaker 1: the guy in a brown paper bag. That was like
Speaker 1: they would say.
Speaker 2: That the showtime series, Yeah, how did that ultimately lead
Speaker 2: you to great forest?
Speaker 1: Well, so I needed I needed to have a some income,
Speaker 1: and and of course I couldn't work for anyone because
Speaker 1: they didn't have a you know, a visa for a
Speaker 1: work visa. So I I found a person who was
Speaker 1: willing to hire me to help him do marketing on
Speaker 1: green products like he had. He had this diaper that
Speaker 1: was supposed to be biodegradable, you know, and he wanted
Speaker 1: also to sell recycled paper and things like that. So,
Speaker 1: you know, I was in marketing in IBM, and so
Speaker 1: I was pretty felt confident to be able to do this.
Speaker 1: And he was going to pay me twenty bucks an
Speaker 1: hour or one hundred dollars a day or something like that.
Speaker 1: So what I did was I incorporated a company and
Speaker 1: I named it after the Amazon basin the Amazon forest,
Speaker 1: which is called La Grande Floresta that's whatever, and couser.
Speaker 1: They didn't call the Amazon, it is lagran Fleest. So
Speaker 1: I named the company Great Forest. And this guy paid
Speaker 1: Great Forest, and then Great Forest paid all my expenses,
Speaker 1: like my rent and everything else. And that's how I
Speaker 1: got around, and eventually Great Forest sponsored me for a
Speaker 1: work visa, so then I could pay myself and actually
Speaker 1: pay taxes to That happened after about six or eight months.
Speaker 2: And what was the connection with Great Forest? Ultimately I
Speaker 2: understood and from all of the research that I did
Speaker 2: with recycling and getting larger companies to participate, is that correct?
Speaker 1: Right? So what it does and it's still around a
Speaker 1: large successful company now, is it looks at large office
Speaker 1: buildings and big corporations fortune five hundred size and helps
Speaker 1: them to set recycling and that helps them to manage
Speaker 1: all the contracts with the garbage hole is the recycling,
Speaker 1: and so like all of that and keep all of
Speaker 1: that intact and tight, and then helps the companies prepare
Speaker 1: all of the statistics that they need for their own
Speaker 1: corporate records and things so.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, which we never think of. That is
Speaker 2: you know, we were a consumer and disposal for making
Speaker 2: that up society. But you know, we take it, we
Speaker 2: put it somewhere, and it's gone without giving a lot
Speaker 2: of thoughts of the process of removing that for the
Speaker 2: better or for the worse. It's for us, it's just God.
Speaker 2: But it's fascinating to see how much is involved with
Speaker 2: getting it gone and getting it in a way that
Speaker 2: it's it's not harmful, it could possibly be even beneficial.
Speaker 2: But let's continue. Be aware of the time from Great
Speaker 2: Forest you left and then you started another organization that
Speaker 2: you have involvement with. You started in one capacity and
Speaker 2: you have a new capacity. But let's talk a little
Speaker 2: bit about Pure Earth. How did you what is it?
Speaker 2: When did you found it? And tell us about it?
Speaker 2: What is it about?
Speaker 1: Well after about about let me see, now, about fifteen
Speaker 1: years of Great Forest and it started to really be successful.
Speaker 1: It went through that early phase of hard, hard work
Speaker 1: without much returning and eventually by this time I married
Speaker 1: with a couple of gorgeous kids and have a nice
Speaker 1: house in Tuxedo Park. You know, so living the good
Speaker 1: life and you know, doing doing good things and the
Speaker 1: staff of twenty people plus or so. But it was
Speaker 1: a bit dissatisfying in the end as well, because it
Speaker 1: wasn't satisfying those things that I wrote down. I wasn't
Speaker 1: making a difference because when you look at recycling, it helps,
Speaker 1: it helps your carbon footprint, but only a little bit.
Speaker 1: It's not really a huge impact. It makes people feel
Speaker 1: happy when they do recycling, which is great, but it's
Speaker 1: not saving anyone's lives good, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: So the impact is kind of a little marginal. So
Speaker 1: I said, okay, what could I do next to do
Speaker 1: something that would have more impact? And we spent By
Speaker 1: this time I had a bunch of advisors and people
Speaker 1: who wanted to talk about it all, and we looked
Speaker 1: at the globe from different directions. We looked at it
Speaker 1: from the problems of climate change, and then from destruction
Speaker 1: of natural resources by university loss specifically, and then also
Speaker 1: about oceans, what was going on with oceans, and then
Speaker 1: finally about pollution. And the thing that was the eye
Speaker 1: opener was to see were there nonprofit entities, you know,
Speaker 1: people trying to do good from the West, from high
Speaker 1: income countries, in low and middle income countries on those things,
Speaker 1: and there were for climate change, for oceans, and for biodiversity.
Speaker 1: There were a lot of very good organizations doing some
Speaker 1: pretty good work and they're still going and you know
Speaker 1: who they are, you know, they're all of the big groups.
Speaker 1: But no one was doing anything about pollution. And it
Speaker 1: was like, oh, we've dealt with pollution in the West,
Speaker 1: but I know from my travels that the rivers are
Speaker 1: stinky and the garbage is everywhere. When you go to
Speaker 1: the poorer countries, it is horrid. That's how we started out.
Speaker 1: Realized that's the gap, right.
Speaker 2: What what what have you put in place to be
Speaker 2: able to deal with that? How? How what kind of
Speaker 2: improvements have you institute are you looking to institute?
Speaker 1: Well, the first thing that we did trying to be
Speaker 1: a little bit methodical about it, Frank, we chose four
Speaker 1: countries that were all anglifiles. I didn't have to worry
Speaker 1: about translation the Amazon and learning Portuguese. Man, I didn't
Speaker 1: want to have to do that again. And my wife
Speaker 1: is a Latina, so she so I learned Spanish, so
Speaker 1: that was that was plenty. So it chose four different
Speaker 1: countries and myself and a partner visited them and went
Speaker 1: through all of the critical things that you need to
Speaker 1: worry about if you're going to be managing pollution properly.
Speaker 1: Have you got sanitation systems in place you know you're
Speaker 1: managing your poop. Have you got good regulations for clean
Speaker 1: air and clean water? Even if they're not being complied with,
Speaker 1: you actually have the regulations in place. Do you have
Speaker 1: wasyts of handling really toxic nasty stuff? Is that sorted out? Okay?
Speaker 1: They're being managed at all? Do you have a civil
Speaker 1: society who can do on scream when things go real bad?
Speaker 1: You know those sort of questions. And so we would
Speaker 1: go and like evaluate this in a bunch of different
Speaker 1: countries and see what we could do. And I started
Speaker 1: doing little projects ten thousand dollars. It's taking money from
Speaker 1: the recycling business and funneling it ten thousand at a
Speaker 1: time to different people to try and fix different things.
Speaker 1: So in Thailand, I funded a couple of guys to
Speaker 1: get on a boat and go and dig the garbage
Speaker 1: out of the klongs out of the canals in this
Speaker 1: one area that was just oh filled with rats and
Speaker 1: horrid stuff. And they just picked it out and then
Speaker 1: carted it off to the landfill and they for ten grand.
Speaker 1: They did that for about six months and it cleaned
Speaker 1: up the whole area around it was fantastic. And another
Speaker 1: place we found a place where there was all this
Speaker 1: lead from a battery recycling facility and we had that
Speaker 1: shipped away and moved somewhere else, so it wasn't poisoning
Speaker 1: the kids that were downstream from it at all. So
Speaker 1: little things like this, to see what would work with
Speaker 1: someone who could, you know, work from a wealthy country,
Speaker 1: maybe go and raise money and do more and more
Speaker 1: wanted to see what would be effective over time. The
Speaker 1: thing that kept coming back more and more was that
Speaker 1: the highly toxic sites were really the big problems out there,
Speaker 1: and there are cities where the level of toxicity is
Speaker 1: so bad from different kinds of chemicals. The life expectancies
Speaker 1: back in the thirties and forties, you know, people just
Speaker 1: get sick and die because there's so much lead or
Speaker 1: kinds of pesticides, all these sort of things around. And
Speaker 1: so you have to focus to be good at being
Speaker 1: an NGO, You have to have as best a focus
Speaker 1: as possible because when you have something that's very specific
Speaker 1: that you say you can achieve, then people want to
Speaker 1: give you money to see that happen. Right. People will
Speaker 1: give you a certain amount of money with just a
Speaker 1: broad general idea, But if you want to get the
Speaker 1: big bucks, you have to be very, very tight and
Speaker 1: have something that you say you can actually do that
Speaker 1: will improve people's lives substantially. So we first we started
Speaker 1: on toxics and toxic sites, and I got money from
Speaker 1: the European Union, then from the World Bank, then from
Speaker 1: USAID and others, and we started doing an inventory of
Speaker 1: acute toxic sites. These were places where minimum two thousand
Speaker 1: people were being poisoned at levels where you would see hundreds,
Speaker 1: if not thousands of deaths a year. And that data
Speaker 1: set is still there and growing, and that's that project
Speaker 1: still keeps going and it's and so that was our
Speaker 1: first focus, whereas where are the big toxic sites and
Speaker 1: big toxic problems. Then the next thing was we started
Speaker 1: to look at all these sites. We had five thousand
Speaker 1: sites in the database after a while, and we thought,
Speaker 1: holy crap, half of them are lead. Lead is a
Speaker 1: big deal. We worry about lead here. Lead and paint right,
Speaker 1: nasty stuff damages children's brains, right, causes them to be
Speaker 1: less intelligent, more problems with learning and the rest of it.
Speaker 1: You didn't know also that it causes heart disease, and
Speaker 1: the latest science is the lead causes almost as much
Speaker 1: heart disease as smoking does. That's new. People don't know
Speaker 1: that as well. It hurts adults just as much as
Speaker 1: it hurts kids, but that's new science. But we found
Speaker 1: lead being so predominant that we started to put all
Speaker 1: of our attention just on lead. So Pure Earth has
Speaker 1: now become the organization that's leading the charge to reduce
Speaker 1: lead exposures around the world. So like already in the US,
Speaker 1: we've done so much on lead that levels are down
Speaker 1: really at a low level, at a level that's pretty good.
Speaker 1: And whenever a kid ends up getting lead because they
Speaker 1: ate the wrong apple juice or whatever, people come in
Speaker 1: and pay attention and they try to stop it. But
Speaker 1: overseas in the poor countries, lead levels are ten times higher.
Speaker 1: No one's measuring, no one's paying any intention, no one
Speaker 1: even knows where the lead's coming from, and there's a
Speaker 1: huge amount of premature death, brain damage, loss of productivity.
Speaker 1: Ever runs a little dumb than they should be. Everyone's
Speaker 1: like five IQ points dumber than they should be in
Speaker 1: the majority of the world. So we say the threshold
Speaker 1: in the US ought to be three point five. This
Speaker 1: is the number that doctors look at it. If you're
Speaker 1: below three point five, you're okay. Well. In the poorer
Speaker 1: parts of the world, more than half of them are
Speaker 1: above three point five. More than fifty percent of people
Speaker 1: are above three point five.
Speaker 2: In people seem share. That has long lasting effects, not
Speaker 2: only health, with economy because as you mentioned, the intelligence
Speaker 2: level is lesser, so people can't achieve on the same
Speaker 2: level because they're physically and then ultimately also mentally not
Speaker 2: as healthy as others. That's incredible, it really is.
Speaker 1: And there's a there's a relationship between intelligence and how
Speaker 1: much you earn in your lifetime. So for every IQ
Speaker 1: point you lose, it's like I don't know how many
Speaker 1: thousands or tens of thousands of dollars you earn less,
Speaker 1: so you're less productive. So the economy shrinks because of
Speaker 1: this five IQ points throughout the entire country that's been lost.
Speaker 2: It's incredible. Let's know, you have a new role. You
Speaker 2: founded it and you were cheap executive assume in the beginning,
Speaker 2: but you have a new role at Pure Talk a
Speaker 2: little bit about that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So you know, the organization has grown now is
Speaker 1: to the point where we're spending say ten million a
Speaker 1: year funding from many, many different sources, and we're about
Speaker 1: to double in size and then potentially a triple in
Speaker 1: size over the next few years. So one of the
Speaker 1: one of the problems I had was I got some
Speaker 1: horror disease on one of these trips to one of
Speaker 1: these countries, and as it left me a little disabled.
Speaker 1: So I've got an autoimmune now from from from these trips.
Speaker 1: So I turned the management of the organization over to
Speaker 1: a fantastic guy, Drew mccata, and he's doing a brilliant
Speaker 1: job in managing the organization. And I'm staying on in
Speaker 1: making sure we do the right strategies to reduce blood
Speaker 1: levels as cost effectively as possible. So I'm the chief
Speaker 1: research and strategy kind of guy at the organization. It's
Speaker 1: a good role for me because I don't have to
Speaker 1: work seventy hours a week. I can just work thirty hours,
Speaker 1: which is as much as my body can handle at
Speaker 1: the moment, and it works out well.
Speaker 2: Great. Let's talk about some of the key successes that
Speaker 2: Pure Earth has had so far, What would you like
Speaker 2: to crow about? Give you a chance to do that?
Speaker 1: Well, you know a lot of this to be successful. First,
Speaker 1: you need that type focus because people are attracted to
Speaker 1: making a difference. It's something that they can measure. But
Speaker 1: also you need to have a network. You need to
Speaker 1: have a lot of people who were enrolled in the
Speaker 1: same idea who want to move things along. And the
Speaker 1: biggest community out there, you know, is the United Nations
Speaker 1: and all of those groups, the United Nations Development Program
Speaker 1: and you in Environment Program and wh O and all
Speaker 1: the rest of it. So I wanted to get them
Speaker 1: worried about pollution broadly. And to do that I did
Speaker 1: a really significant report in the Lancet. It was a commission,
Speaker 1: you know, one of these commissions and Lancet publisher. It's
Speaker 1: called the Commission on Pollution and Health, and it came
Speaker 1: out in two thousand and seventeen, I think, and it
Speaker 1: was the It was just a groundbreaking report. It showed
Speaker 1: that seven million people one in six deaths because of pollution, air, pollution,
Speaker 1: contaminated soil, all these sorts of things, and it was
Speaker 1: just an eye opener for the whole UN system. They
Speaker 1: all started to think and work on pollution, and I'm
Speaker 1: really proud of that. And then similarly, when we started
Speaker 1: to focus just specifically on lead, I wrote another report,
Speaker 1: this time with UNISEF, and this one was about the
Speaker 1: overall impact of lead in the world globally, and that
Speaker 1: one's called the Toxic Truth, and that was also one
Speaker 1: of those things that shifted the whole way that all
Speaker 1: of these different agencies to focus specifically now on lead.
Speaker 1: And it's really worked, It's really worked.
Speaker 2: Let's talk a little bit about your book. We got
Speaker 2: one coming up, and we talk about that after the break,
Speaker 2: and we also want to talk a little bit about
Speaker 2: some of the changes I mentioned the administrations trying to backtrack,
Speaker 2: if you will, some of the hard work that you've
Speaker 2: already done. You mentioned us ai D and many of
Speaker 2: the other the EPA that is potentially suffering serious cuts,
Speaker 2: and I want to know what effect that might have.
Speaker 2: But we'll put that off the way after the break
Speaker 2: and discussing your new book. But before that, let's talk
Speaker 2: a little bit about the Brown Agenda. Your book. Tell
Speaker 2: us about it.
Speaker 1: Well, it's a book I wrote after all of those
Speaker 1: adventures in the rainforests and starting up pure earth and
Speaker 1: the rest of it. And it's a nice read. It's
Speaker 1: got a lot of good entertaining stories in it, from
Speaker 1: being chased around by the mafia in New York City
Speaker 1: as well as you know. It doesn't do with that.
Speaker 2: I didn't even know you then, I promised, So I
Speaker 2: highly recommend it.
Speaker 1: It's out there on Amazon. It hasn't been a huge
Speaker 1: best seller, but it's very it's you will enjoy it,
Speaker 1: and it's, uh, it's not technical. It's more about, you know,
Speaker 1: what I've done in the world, and then what are
Speaker 1: these problems really? Like? What is it this problem with
Speaker 1: mercury and gold mining, for example, and how does that work?
Speaker 1: What's going on with these acute pesticides. So you learn
Speaker 1: a lot, I think, just from reading it, and I
Speaker 1: promise you it will not be a heavy lift. It's
Speaker 1: much more fun than that. Cool.
Speaker 2: Well, tell a little bit about the title, the Brown Agenda.
Speaker 1: So it's called the brown Agenda because the Green Agenda
Speaker 1: is about biodiversity. The blue Agenda is about seas and oceans.
Speaker 1: I don't know what the climate agenda color that is,
Speaker 1: but the Brown Agenda makes sense I think for the
Speaker 1: toxics side of things. So that's how I named it.
Speaker 2: All right, We've got more to talk about, including your
Speaker 2: new book, Fixing It, and we're going to find out
Speaker 2: how you're going to fix it. Put you on the
Speaker 2: spot a little bit, No, yeah, it's a little bit.
Speaker 2: I'm sure. After the New York Mafia and the Brazilian
Speaker 2: Amason for your life, I'm sure you can handle me.
Speaker 2: This has been absolutely great so far. I also want
Speaker 2: to get your take on some of the changes that
Speaker 2: we can expect with cut funding. How how what's the
Speaker 2: strategy to keep moving forward? I think you your opinion
Speaker 2: on that will will certainly hold some weight. So you
Speaker 2: want everybody to stay with us. This is Being Frank.
Speaker 2: I'm your host, uh and we'll have more right after
Speaker 2: these brief commercial messages. Please don't go anywhere yet.
Speaker 3: This is Hudson River Radio dot com.
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Speaker 2: Welcome back to Being Frank the Intelligent Conversation Podcast. Thanks
Speaker 2: for sticking with us. I'm your host, Frank Nibono. As always,
Speaker 2: our engineers the mailman because he always delivers mister Neil Richter.
Speaker 2: You know, we bring our audience a fresh topic just
Speaker 2: about every week and stream from Hudson and River Radio,
Speaker 2: located and beautiful and historic Stony Point, New York. But remember,
Speaker 2: you can catch Being Frank anywhere you get your favorite
Speaker 2: podcasts like Apple, Spotify, iHeartRadio and all the others. And
Speaker 2: because every Being Frank is archived, you can listen to
Speaker 2: any of our programs anytime you like. Find the link
Speaker 2: to Being Frank on the Hudson River Radio Facebook page
Speaker 2: or at our website Hudson Riverradio dot com. Just click
Speaker 2: and you're there. Let's get back to our conversation with
Speaker 2: Richard Fuller. He's an environmentalist and activist and author and
Speaker 2: so much more. We've have great conversations so far, and
Speaker 2: we teased your new book that you're writing. It's called
Speaker 2: Fixing It tell us about.
Speaker 1: Oh, I think it's too early to talk too much
Speaker 1: about it, but tease us. Yeah. I think what I've
Speaker 1: learned from having, you know, started this work that now
Speaker 1: has grown into an international movement is a few key
Speaker 1: lessons in what you need to do to make a difference.
Speaker 1: You know, we all all want to make a difference
Speaker 1: in the world, have impact, and there are certain important
Speaker 1: things that one can focus on. And when I started
Speaker 1: to think about this a bit, I realized that if
Speaker 1: I hadn't known some of these things, I might have
Speaker 1: been able to get to where we are now, maybe
Speaker 1: five years or so quicker than the twenty five years
Speaker 1: that's taken. So I thought I ought to get that
Speaker 1: out there. So it's it's in early draft stages and
Speaker 1: quite a way to go, but we'll we'll slowly plug
Speaker 1: away and give it a year or two and we'll
Speaker 1: have something out there and I'll let you know.
Speaker 2: Uh, Richard, there these are tough times to kind of
Speaker 2: navigate through. There's been so much that's happening. Cuts here,
Speaker 2: changes there, personnel moves. How do we continue to move forward?
Speaker 2: How do we navigate to a more healthy way of
Speaker 2: living for everyone, not only for Americans but internationally. There's
Speaker 2: so many marginalized communities that that have gotten forgotten. How
Speaker 2: do we keep it in people's minds and that change
Speaker 2: has to continue. We have to move this forward or
Speaker 2: we could lose the planet. How do we do that?
Speaker 1: Well, you know, we keep doing what we're doing. I mean,
Speaker 1: there are setbacks and having us a I D shut
Speaker 1: down is you know, really a big one. But there
Speaker 1: is a lot of people out there who really really
Speaker 1: want to see the world get better and focusing specifically
Speaker 1: on something and working towards it. There are a lot
Speaker 1: of ways to work that you can do outside of government,
Speaker 1: outside of needing financial contributions from the government. There's been
Speaker 1: so much wealth created in the last couple of decades,
Speaker 1: especially on the West Coast, that people are really sitting
Speaker 1: on big pools and reservoirs and money and very little
Speaker 1: that actually has started to go out into its philanthropic
Speaker 1: eventual routes. You know, most of the billionaires have signed
Speaker 1: on to the Giving Pledge where they say they'll give
Speaker 1: away for common good most of their money before they die.
Speaker 1: Very few have actually done anything about it. So there
Speaker 1: is there will be, you know, financing money over the
Speaker 1: next decads to come because of this enormous wealth created
Speaker 1: through the Internet that we'll see. And it's a matter
Speaker 1: of working out how to tap that and working out
Speaker 1: an idea that's important and then working out how to
Speaker 1: tap it. And I don't say it's easy, but there
Speaker 1: is always resources if you've got something good.
Speaker 2: Let's talk about a vision for the future, a realistic vision.
Speaker 2: I mean, we're all you know in our head. Perhaps
Speaker 2: you're flowing streams and mother nature and butterflies and et
Speaker 2: cetera in a perfect utopian world. But what does a
Speaker 2: healthy real world look like Richard from an environmental standpoint.
Speaker 1: Well, I mean, the first thing you've got to know,
Speaker 1: and everyone needs to if you just remember, there's one thing.
Speaker 1: The world has gotten enormously better over the last fifty years.
Speaker 1: You know, the rivers are cleaner, the beaches are cleaner,
Speaker 1: the cities are safer. The level of education of people
Speaker 1: in general has gotten enormously better, including goals. Goals are
Speaker 1: almost as well educated as boys these days. Life expectancy
Speaker 1: has gone up enormously. So we've already had incredible success
Speaker 1: in making the world a better place. So it's not
Speaker 1: that we are definitely not on a path in a
Speaker 1: negative direction. This is a little bump that's going on,
Speaker 1: but overall, the trend over the last few decades has
Speaker 1: been ones of incredible success and incredible positive outcomes for
Speaker 1: pretty much most of the world. There are pockets, of course,
Speaker 1: where things are in terrible shape, but in general, you
Speaker 1: really got to got to look at the statistics to
Speaker 1: understand that.
Speaker 2: When does Richard Fuller get to a point where he says, ah,
Speaker 2: I've done what I've set out to do.
Speaker 1: I can read It'll be the last breath. It's really
Speaker 1: fun and interesting to do all this work, Frank, I
Speaker 1: really enjoy it. It could go get a little slow
Speaker 1: that there's there. You know, one doesn't stop doing this
Speaker 1: just because what would I do play golf again?
Speaker 2: I never did, so can be had that conversation, you know, Richard.
Speaker 2: People can't see us, unfortunately, we only trains. We only
Speaker 2: stream the audio and not the video. But I wish
Speaker 2: people could see the big smile on your face and
Speaker 2: how truly happy you are to have done this and
Speaker 2: to continue to do it. It means a lot, really does.
Speaker 1: I'm glad and I feel very fortunate that I've had success,
Speaker 1: that things have gone well, and this area is burgeoning,
Speaker 1: and it's a kind of an extraordinary feeling that there's
Speaker 1: there's roughly three or four million people who died from
Speaker 1: lead poisoning every year. You can compare to malaria. Malaria
Speaker 1: is around I think five hundred thousand deaths a year.
Speaker 1: So if we can even reduce the amount of lead
Speaker 1: poisoning by twenty you know, that's already more than malaria deaths.
Speaker 1: It's an incredible opportunity to be able to make the
Speaker 1: world a better place to focus on this particular issue.
Speaker 1: So I feel really lucky and fortunate to have turned
Speaker 1: it over so the world can see it and work
Speaker 1: on it, and now to have so many fantastic partners
Speaker 1: and people working on this, brilliant staff, brilliant other organizations
Speaker 1: all around the world working on this issue. So it's
Speaker 1: a real satisfycing real satisfaction.
Speaker 2: Can can you give us a website of some of
Speaker 2: that may be Pure Earth or whatever? People do want
Speaker 2: to know more, get more information, get involved. How can yeah?
Speaker 1: Pure Earth dot oig is our main website. There's other
Speaker 1: sister organizations, the Global Alliance on Health and Pollution g
Speaker 1: a HP dot net and e T also is a
Speaker 1: great organization doing doing phenomenal, phenomenal work in all of this.
Speaker 1: Another one called the Lead Elimination Project LEAP. I think
Speaker 1: it's I think it's I don't know. It's website off hand,
Speaker 1: also fantastic. There are great organizations in this space doing
Speaker 1: great things.
Speaker 2: Anything one to order the book again?
Speaker 1: Given another Amazon the Brown Agenda, rich Fuller, and look
Speaker 1: it up on the Amazon and yeah, you can even
Speaker 1: get a download audio of it if you want to.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you're from Niac too, So there's a lot I
Speaker 2: like about you, Richard. I don't know if that's a
Speaker 2: good thing or on your point of view, but really,
Speaker 2: this has been a great conversation. I certainly learned a lot,
Speaker 2: and I really appreciate you taking the time out of
Speaker 2: a very busy schedule.
Speaker 1: My pleasure. It's fun to do it.
Speaker 2: Thank you both, oh more pleasure. Of course. We offer
Speaker 2: special thanks to our listeners who take the time to
Speaker 2: give us a voice in their lives. We offer a
Speaker 2: fresh topic every week. Catch us wherever and whenever you'll
Speaker 2: get your favorite podcasts. Can also check us out on
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Speaker 2: that you consider sharing being frank with others. You always
Speaker 2: leave you with two last little callum nuggets for lack
Speaker 2: of a better word, closing slogan that I think is appropriate,
Speaker 2: and a little bit of original music, usually composed and
Speaker 2: performed by some friends. This one is from Albert Einstein
Speaker 2: and he says our task must be to free ourselves
Speaker 2: by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living
Speaker 2: creatures in the whole of nature and its beauty. All right,
Speaker 2: We've got some great music written by, as I said,
Speaker 2: some friends and performed also by these friends. It's written
Speaker 2: by Steven Swan who performs along with David Snyder and
Speaker 2: Sarah Eller. And how perfect the song is. Save the
Speaker 2: world or Engineer Neil Richter. I'm your host, Frank Lubono.
Speaker 2: We hope to have you join us for the next being. Frank,
Speaker 2: We're the only way you could be is Frank. Thanks?
Speaker 3: Everybody said land, God jus, Oh can yeah, said.
Speaker 1: The land.
Speaker 4: Said land, Come on, let us go? Who I who have?
Speaker 4: Can we see? Our responsive will see we give the
Speaker 4: earth a sympathy?
Speaker 1: Who I am having? Can't we see? Hear? On?
Speaker 4: Heartbeat on the land? We then do and oh again,
Speaker 4: raise our voices? Give or please?
Speaker 1: Why in heaven have we see?
Speaker 4: Listen to everybody? We pass out of that scarling out
Speaker 4: the all of us and help joining in the fight
Speaker 4: Mother nature sime slowly being the stoy, all the bees,
Speaker 4: trees and flowers.
Speaker 1: They will be around now. We got to see pees.
Speaker 4: On again, I said, we have got.
Speaker 3: To see see.
Speaker 1: Let's go why in heaven?
Speaker 2: Why in heaven?
Speaker 1: And can we see?
Speaker 4: Give her? All the guns and planes were at each
Speaker 4: other stills again, give you a seven fee?
Speaker 1: Why in heaven can't we see? Listen?
Speaker 4: Every variety the week cries over that, so all allow
Speaker 4: the arm of us to help join in her fight.
Speaker 4: Mother and me dying. She'd slowly being destroyed. All the bese,
Speaker 4: trees and fountains. We got to have saved an please
Speaker 4: to do on again?
Speaker 1: I said, we have got to see see the long so.
Speaker 4: Oh, we have got.
Speaker 2: To see the man.
Speaker 4: Excuse again, I said, we have got to see that happened?
Speaker 4: See see I can't get help.
Speaker 1: Why in heaven?
Speaker 2: I said?
Speaker 1: Climate change and whying happened? That we see why in heaven?
Speaker 1: Said the last? You gotta see why a happened?
Speaker 2: That you got dirty water?
Speaker 1: Huh?
Speaker 4: You got the new world? All the yeah hump?
Speaker 3: Why a heaven?
Speaker 4: Seven man? Seven babies? Seven people say, my mom.
Speaker 2: You know what a ride?
Speaker 4: You know? Anybody know.
Speaker 1: Why heaven.
Speaker 2: And why you have?
Speaker 3: When you see.
Speaker 1: Why?
Speaker 4: Head? Can we see? I tend to see why heaven?
Speaker 1: Rye rye? Why let's see why?
Speaker 4: You know any rhymes not any about no
Speaker 2: Hudson River Radio dot com h