'Tis the season to be fair and green.

• Author: Pennybacker, Mindy
• Position: GREEN GUIDANCE

Most of us, nowadays, are consumers rather than producers of food. Still, from autumn through the winter solstice, we celebrate the harvest and brighten the long nights with festivals such as Homowo, Chu Seok, Zhongqiu Jie, Hounen-Odori, Tet Trung Thu, Eid Al-fitr, Diwali, Yalda, Thanksgiving, Hannukah, Kwanzaa, and Christmas. Unfortunately, while leading less-active, post-agrarian lifestyles, many of us eat far more than is healthy for ourselves or the environment (see "Meat: Now It's Not Personal," Worldwatch July/August 2004). And our uncurbed appetite for other products--including holiday gifts--contributes to industrial pollution, depletion of natural resources and sweatshops.

In the United States alone, total retail sales in December 2003 were $340 billion, an increase of more than 6 percent over December 2002. About $55 billion was spent on toys, "60 percent of which are made in Chinese sweatshops ...," Juliet Schor, professor of sociology at Boston College, reports in State of the World 2004. In the past 10 years, Schor adds, U.S. toy prices have fallen by 33 percent and apparel prices by 10 percent, largely due to cheap labor. Meanwhile, a growing global consumer class now totals 1.7 billion, of which China and India represent more than 20 percent.

Should we cut back on gifts, or perhaps give none at all? Try suggesting this to the children in your life; while you think of yourself as a tree-saving Lorax, they will see the Grinch. Instead, we can simplify and lighten up the holidays by buying fewer non-essentials and choosing products that are less toxic and more environmentally and labor friendly. Here are a few suggestions for your list:

Choose PVC- and Lead-Free Toys. Do be a Scrooge about polyvinyl chloride, or PVC vinyl, whose manufacture and disposal release toxic dioxins into our air, water, and food. Soft PVC contains plasticizers known as phthalates, which have been linked to cancers and reproductive harm in animal studies. Britain has banned soft PVC toys, and an EU study has recommended that all member countries do the same. The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission has asked that manufacturers voluntarily not use soft PVC in "mouth" toys for children under three. Companies that have gone PVC-free include Brio, IKEA, Lego, Primetime Playthings, Early Start, Sassy, and Tiny Love. Other PVC products, such as some children's backpacks, have been found to be tainted with lead. As a rule, avoid cheap toys made with metal or...