Carbon offsets:

Let the peasants deal with your jet emissions!

What an idea!
Somewhere in the Indian countryside, a farmer is about to repay Mr Cameron’s debt to the planet. Climate Care’s latest enterprise is to provide “treadle pumps” to poor rural families so they can get water on to their land without using diesel power. The pumps are worked by stepping on pedals. If a peasant treads for two hours a day, it will take at least three years to offset the CO2 from Mr Cameron’s return flight to India.

What was that line, "It's good to be the King!"?

Check this out in the 'salve your conscience by paying a peasant to do without' category:

Treadle pumps A century after treadmills were abolished in British prisons, peasant farmers are being encouraged to irrigate land using “human power” rather than diesel pumps. Supporters say that the project alleviates poverty, improves agriculture and enables men to stay with families instead of going to cities for work. It is being introduced in the Indian regions of Chhattisgarh and West Bengal

Burning dung Instead of using firewood for stoves, villagers are encouraged to collect cowpats and water and put them into “biogas digesters”, which create renewable fuel. The project is close to an tiger reserve at Ranthambhore National Park in Rajasthan. Supporters say that it spares the trees, which are the tigers’ habitat

Hey, I've got an idea: instead of collecting cow crap, how about electric or gas stoves? Of course that means the dirty peasants have to have electricity or gas, and one cannot offset one's lifestyle if they move into current times, now can one? And if spending hours a day manually pumping water wears you out and restricts the land you can work, well, that is The Price We Pay to offset our mansion(s) and our jets, private and otherwise, and our other modern conveniences.

Read the whole damn thing. Be prepared to wonder where Grandpa's whip is, and can you put up a post in the town square?