“Drill baby drill!” These chilling words announced by Donald Trump at his inauguration on 20 January herald four years of doom for planet Earth. Not only does the President want to drill for the still plentiful “liquid gold” under US soil, he supports it coming from the pristine Alaskan Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, protected for its grizzly and polar bears, wolves, caribou and over 200 bird species. Added to that disastrous policy announcement he’s decided that old growth forests in Alaska can be logged. Plus he withdrew from the Paris climate agreement which aims to keep global warming to below 1.5 degrees, a level already reached in 2024 according to Copernicus Climate Change Service.

It’s not just the US that’s happy to destroy the environment to “be a rich nation.” In the UK, policies are being pursued that got us into the deep waters of climate breakdown in the first place, namely economic growth, people having more and the rest of the planet can hang. After all its greenwashing language during the election campaign, the Labour Government is showing its true colour. They’re determined to give the green light to airport expansion in the South East. They promised to clean up rivers, rightly blaming water companies for dumping sewage but totally ignoring the contribution to pollution made by the hundreds of massive chicken farms in the catchment area of the Wye and the Severn. On 9 January, Steve Reed, the Environment Secretary said, “We will speed up the [planning] system so you can grow and diversify your farm business, such as chicken producers who need a larger shed to increase the amount of food they produce.” Farming and planning are both devolved matters but the message sent by the UK Government is clear, do what you need to do as long as it produces economic growth. Will Labour in Wales follow sheep-like?

It’s so depressing and many environmental campaigners wish to give up. The economic system that has caused all the environmental damage cannot possibly be used for getting us out of it. How many storms will it take, how many Los Angeles burned to a cinder and how many species lost before most humans take climate change seriously? A Cree proverb states, “Only when the last tree has died and the last river has been poisoned and the last fish has been caught will we realise we cannot eat money.”

We have lost enough already. Looking for hope, I found it locally. Two great stories caught my eye, pupils in Ceredigion schools eating vegetables grown organically in west Wales. I’d like to see all schools participate in this scheme but also hospitals and restaurants. The other positive story came from Borth where a new farmers’ market has started, weekly and indoors. I hope it grows to be a long-term success that other towns can copy. By buying and eating local food, we may be able to defeat Trump’s aim of flooding our markets with American trash like chlorinated chickens.

Local food should be affordable to all. Unfortunately, besides those two good news stories there’s a report of people unable to keep their house warm. Such families will be looking to buy the cheapest and won’t care where it comes from or what damages are wrought to our planet. This energy crisis needs to be tackled properly and fairly. By making energy cheap the Trump way, we’ll simply create more problems and in the end we’ll all suffer. It means taking a good look at inequality. Now that’s something I thought socialists like Labour were good at but I fear Labour has lost its way.