Family finds life is simpler without fruits of the rainforest

Could you spend a week living without anything sourced from the rainforests? Sheena Hastings speaks to one family that did.

CLAIRE O’Connor was none too keen when Sky TV asked her family to audition for a programme about living for a week without using anything that had been made using materials sourced from rainforests.

A busy mother of four – Kitty, four, Claudia, six, Charlie, eight, and 16-year-old Harry – who also runs a baby ballet business, Claire didn’t feel she could spare the time to be followed around by a TV crew.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

“They approached us because my husband Chris had taken part in a game show a few years ago, and his name had stayed on a list somewhere,” says the 39-year-old, who lives in Halifax.

However, Chris, 37, who runs first aid training courses and their sons were excited and thought the family could learn a lot from the experience.

Even after they had been interviewed and chosen as the “normal family” to take part in the experiment, they still only had a sketchy notion of how their life would be affected.

“The boys were so very enthusiastic, I had to agree,” says Claire. “To be honest, we were all sort of aware of issues of sustainability of rainforests, but considering how easy it is to look things up on the internet, we didn’t know enough.”

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

On the first day of filming they were told to go out for a couple of hours while all items made with the benefit of rainforest products were removed or parcelled up. On their return the O’Connors were shocked at how many items of furniture were missing and how empty the cupboards were.

“We’d tried to figure out which things might be involved – like tropical fruit and maybe the cars because of the rubber in the tyres...but we got nowhere 
near imagining the quantity of stuff they actually ended up removing.”

They returned to find that Claire’s pink Beetle car had been clamped. All electronic devices including TVs, set-top box and the dvd player were gone, as were Harry’s iPod and computer and the kettle, microwave, fridge and oven. All of these had rubber components sourced in rainforest areas such as the Amazon.

“The hardwood front door was gone; all the cleaning stuffs, toiletries and my make-up were gone too, because so many items contain palm oil. The kitchen, which had had loads of the children’s artwork on the walls, was bare because the drawings were on paper.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

“There was barely any food in the cupboards – almost everything gone, including tea, coffee, biscuits and sugar. Apples, some vegetables, cheese, dried pasta and white bread were left.

“Our pictures and mirrors with hardwood frames were gone, and Harry’s wooden bed had been replaced by a fold-up metal camp bed. All the toys and games had disappeared, apart from Connect 4, as they either had rubber parts or cardboard packaging. The sofas were gone from the living room and we brought in bales of hay with bed sheets over them. The house felt really soulless.”

Claire says the family don’t take life too seriously, and they all faced the privations of the week in a spirit of adventure.

“It wasn’t about making us feel guilty about the life we lead but simply to raise awareness that so much of what we all take for granted comes from places where the materials may not be sustainably sourced and people may not be paid fairly.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

“After the shock we were asked to go to the local shop to buy food for dinner. It took ages, because if you read the labels there are so many foods that contain ingredients from these vulnerable places. We ended up eating a lot of porridge, pasta, tuna and tinned tomatoes.”

The O’Connors do a lot together as a family, but without the toys, TV and computer they did even more, including going for walks and picking blackberries. They’re now geniuses at Connect 4.

“We looked up lots of information about rainforests and threats to them, stuff we really should have known already,” says Claire. “Since the filming we’ve cut down on the quantities of cleaning products and toiletries we use, and if we were buying an item of furniture we’d want to find out exactly where the materials came from.

“We feel more grateful for what we have, and glad that we’re a bit more aware of ethically made products.”

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

The People’s Rainforest will be screened on Sky1 HD tonight and tomorrow night at 8pm. The programmes support Sky Rainforest Rescue – a partnership with WWF, working with the Acre Government in Brazil to protect a billion trees in the Amazon rainforest. www.rainforestrescue.sky.com

Related topics: