The Centre for Natural Burial

By Michael d’Estries, Green Living

Several years ago, during a stay in Hong Kong for a summer, I often found moments to trek out to the jungle forests that surround the outskirts of the city. Many times, I would wander through abandoned villages where cemeteries long forgotten would blend in with the flora; creating a natural monument unlike any other I’d seen back home. It reminded me that even in death, we can still become part of something massive and alive. It was one of the reasons why I became so fascinated by the green burial movement in the first place.

Anyways, what’s leading me down memory lane is an announcement from the Hong Kong Food and Environmental Hygiene Department that the city will bolster promotion and education on environmentally-friendly burial practices. The department will hold monthly talks on environmentally- friendly burial practices at Kowloon Park in Kowloon and distribute VCDs to organizations providing elderly care and services to promote eco-coffin use.

The department will also work with the funeral trade industry to study the use of eco-friendly coffins in cremation and requiring undertakers to provide eco-coffins under licensing conditions. Facing the same types of odds consistent around the world, only 13 of the 95 licensed undertakers in Hong Kong offer eco-coffins. Still, any education and promotion is a good thing for a trade that consumes and pollutes like few others.

You can check out our video on a green cemetery in Ithaca, NY called GreenSprings here. Have you given any thoughts to how you might want to leave this life?