Jill Barker is the brains behind Green Baby, which sells natural baby products, and like many other new parents she became concerned about harmful chemicals, allergens and pollutants, in her case so much so that she started her own business. Now that the child who inspired it all is nine, Jill has built up a huge reservoir of expertise, and she's passing this on in this book. With sections dealing with the health of the planet, the green nursery, bathroom, wardrobe, etc, it covers fairly familiar territory, but is written in a friendly, accessible style. To avoid preaching, she illustrates her point with stories about how fair trade and organic production have helped the producers she works with - and the wider communities. With plenty of advice on what to avoid (and what to use instead) Baby Green is a useful sourcebook for parents and parents-to-be looking to green up their act and make sure the planet's still inhabitable for their offspring's offspring.
The type is small (which of course means less paper is used in printing) and illustrations are limited to simple line drawings, so it can feel a little heavy going at times, but it's worth persevering as there's lots of useful material - and plenty of ammunition you can use against your less green friends. For example, did you know that the production of disposable nappies uses 4.5 trees per baby, and that seven million trees are felled each year to produce the wood pulp to make disposable nappies in the UK alone?
