Death and what we do with our bodies is a universal, environmental dilemma. It’s also an emotional and complex topic. The ways we approach death and the rituals surrounding it are as diverse as the eight billion people on this planet. But there’s a growing movement to rethink death care in Australia and create more sustainable and meaningful options for end-of-life arrangements. Rather than blanketing the landscape in concrete and marble while our bodies take hundreds of years to decompose below, what if – in the end – we put Mother Earth first? What if we could combine the changes we need to make for the climate with how we are memorialised? And if the current funerary industry sanitises death, hiding bodies and processes away from loved ones, how might closely considering death care open up healthier ways of mourning and processing grief?
“Australians somehow think that death doesn’t happen to them,” says
