WAYS TO SAVE MOTHER EARTH

Since the Industrial Revolution, Morales argues, the world’s Capitalist societies have worked to empower a very few while keeping billions in subjugation. At the same time, the rapacious growth of “developed” nations has helped put humanity on the path to destroying the Earth. The Kyoto Treaty has done little to curb carbon emissions—in fact, since the treaty’s signing, carbon emissions have grown by nearly 10% of 1990 levels. President Morales warns that we must attack the structural causes of climate change to avert further catastrophe. He proposes 20 steps humanity can take to save Mother Earth.

1) Debate the structural causes of climate change. As long as we do not change the capitalist system for a system based in complementarily, solidarity and harmony between the people and nature, the measures that we adopt will be palliatives that will limited and precarious in character. For us, what has failed is the model of “living better”, of unlimited development, industrialization without frontiers, of modernity that deprecates history, of increasing accumulation of goods at the expense of others and nature. For that reason we promote the idea of Living Well, in harmony with other human beings and with our Mother Earth.

2) Developed countries need to control their patterns of consumption — of luxury and waste — especially the excessive consumption of fossil fuels. Subsidies of fossil fuel, that reach $150-250 billion[4], must be progressively eliminated. It is fundamental to develop alternative forms of power, such as solar, geothermal, wind and hydroelectric both at small and medium scales.

3) Agro fuels are not an alternative, because they put the production of foodstuffs for transport before the production of food for human beings. Agro fuels expand the agricultural frontier destroying forests and biodiversity, generate monocropping, promote land concentration, deteriorate soils, exhaust water sources, contribute to rises in food prices and, in many cases, result in more consumption of more energy than is produced.

Substantial commitments to emissions reduction that are met

4) Strict fulfillment by 2012 of the commitments [5] of the developed countries to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by at least by 5% below the 1990 levels. It is unacceptable that the countries that polluted the planet throughout the course of history make statements about larger reductions in the future while not complying with their present commitments.

5) Establish new minimum commitments for the developed countries of greenhouse gas emission reduction of 40% by 2020 and 90% by for 2050, taking as a starting point 1990 emission levels. These minimum commitments must be met internally in developed countries and not through flexible market mechanisms that allow for the purchase of certified emissions reduction certificates to continue polluting in their own country. Likewise, monitoring mechanisms must be established for the measuring, reporting and verifying that are transparent and accessible to the public, to guarantee the compliance of commitments.

6) Developing countries not responsible for the historical pollution must preserve the necessary space to implement an alternative and sustainable form of development that does not repeat the mistakes of savage industrialization that has brought us to the current situation. To ensure this process, developing countries need, as a prerequisite, finance and technology transfer.

Address ecological debt

7) Acknowledging the historical ecological debt that they owe to the planet, developed countries must create an Integral Financial Mechanism to support developing countries in: implementation of their plans and programs for adaptation to and mitigation of climate change; the innovation, development and transfer of technology; in the preservation and improvement of the sinks and reservoirs; response actions to the serious natural disasters caused by climate change; and the carrying out of sustainable and eco-friendly development plans.

8) This Integral Financial Mechanism, in order to be effective, must count on a contribution of at least 1% of the GDP in developed countries[6] and other contributions from taxes on oil and gas, financial transactions, sea and air transport, and the profits of transnational companies.

9) Contributions from developed countries must be additional to Official Development Assistance (ODA), bilateral aid or aid channelled through organisms not part of the United Nations. Any finance outside the UNFCCC cannot be considered as the fulfilment of developed country’s commitments under the convention.

10) Finance has to be directed to the plans or national programs of the different states and not to projects that follow market logic.

11) Financing must not be concentrated just in some developed countries but has to give priority to the countries that have contributed less to greenhouse gas emissions, those that preserve nature and are suffering the impact of climate change.

12) The Integral Financial Mechanism must be under the coverage of the United Nations, not under the Global Environment Facility (GEF) and other intermediaries such as the World Bank and regional development banks; its management must be collective, transparent and non-bureaucratic. Its decisions must be made by all member countries, especially by developing countries, and not by the donors or bureaucratic administrators.

How to Save our Planet Earth

The Johannesburg Summit Provided the Sustainable Development as a Way In Saving Our Planet Earth.

In 1992 World Summit held in Rio de Janeiro, getting rid of pollution was the main agenda as well as making our planet healthy amid industrial progress. However the ratification and implementation of this grand endeavor didn’t materialize, the air we breathe is still enveloped with harmful pollutions, the hole in our ozone layer is getting bigger, the seas and oceans are battered with different problems and issues, and rain forests that serves as a refuge to a delicate ecological balance continues to dwindles.Ten years later in the last 2002 summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg, South Africa, different strategies were dished out and placed in the drawing table. Smarter than the last time the summiteers gave importance of development in saving our very planet we live in. This time, it is well-crafted and well-planned that will lead us to a green century equipped with green approach to deal with present bothering problems we're now facing to preserve our planet.

The sustainable development aim is to expand the source of food for all people, so that they will no longer depend and draw resources from the wild, thus the wilderness and the oceans will have more time to recuperate and regenerate, and eventually be preserved.

“The old environmental movement had a reputation of elitism,” says the United Nations Development program (UNDP) administrator as he added, “The key now is to put people first and the environment second, but also to remember that when you exhaust the resources, you destroy the people."

Here are some issues that affect both people and the environment drawn out during the Johannesburg Summit:

POPULATION AND HEALTH

Population explosion is one of the main issues in the Summit.

 - In Asia the growth rate is projected to be slow in the coming years.

- In parts of the world where poverty is prevalent, like for instance in Africa, diseases like AIDS, malaria and cholera are widely experienced and cause deaths. In the worldwide level at least 68 million are expected to die of AIDS by 2020, a bulk of these which is around 55 million will come from the Sub-Saharan region in Africa.

- Access to family planning and health care for youths and women will be given importance.

WATER

- It is very ironic that the world is surrounded by water and only 2.5% of it is fresh water and a fraction of it is accessible.

- We may face serious water problems, if we will not use our water supply well.

- The summit endorses “More crop per crop” mentality, an approach which is about efficient irrigation technique and planting crop varieties that need less water

FOOD

 - Whipping out and erecting agricultural policies Is one of the core part of the Sustainable Development.

- Planting and replanting the same crops, reliance to pest control and slash-burn method of farming (we call this as “kaingin” in Philippines) degrades the nutrient contents of the soil and making them vulnerable to pests.

- Better crop rotation and irrigation is urged to be implemented across the planet to guarantee good yield as far as farmers are concerned.

- Different research organizations in the world have developed better varieties of corn, cassava, and potato. These achievements must be emulated by other countries.

ENERGY AND CLIMATE

- Power demands of developing countries are expected to grow by 2.5% annually. If those demand are not provided reliance on burning fossil fuels (gas, oil and coal) might be an alternative, if this happens carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases will be produced in our atmosphere, a scenario that will promote global warming paving the way for flooding in lowland areas (because of the rise of sea level and melting of icebergs in the north and south poles), powerful storms, droughts that could lead to famine, climate change and acid rain. A haze which is also known as “Asian Brown Cloud” about 3 kilometers thick, is assumed to be the cause of thousands of deaths in South Asian region last 2001.

- Immediate concern is the heavy pollution, because of over reliance with fossil fuels.

- Developing cheaper and cleaner sources of electricity can also help curb pollution problems like harnessing the wind power, which is now enjoying a boom in India, micro-hydro electric plants that are now utilized as a way of generating electricity in several countries like in Kenya, Sri Lanka and Nepal.

BIODIVERSITY

- More than 11,000 species of animals and plants are threatened to extinction, one third of our corals reefs are expected to disappear after 30 years and areas covered with forests across the planet will continue to decrease each year. Many species of animals that will disappear in the coming years are source of food and medicine for humans. Once a part of the ecosystem is sliced for human habitation and/or farming, expect chain reaction to take place, when you upset the balance of nature you are as well harming some areas you don’t want to disturb.

The problems presented in the 2002 summit in Johannesburg are worse compared to that of 1992 summit in Rio de Janeiro. The summit in in Rio de Janeiro is about getting rid of the plague that causes environmental deterioration and degradation. While that of Johannesburg’s its totally different but perhaps better and even more brilliant, the battle plan that was generated in this particular summit is to solve man’s woes to keep the environment intact.