#mashable #UnitedNations #UN #
UN Week Digital Media Lounge-September 21-24 2010. Should be an interesting week!! Read more at http://mashable.com/un-week/digital-media-lounge/; https://mashable.com/2010/09/24/live-watch-the-un-week-digital-media-lounge-video/; https://mashable.com/2010/08/31/announcing-the-un-week-digital-media-lounge/; https://mashable.com/2010/09/30/mashables-un-week-2010-wrap-report/
Goals of the UN Week Digital Media Lounge include:
(Source: https://mashable.com/2010/08/31/announcing-the-un-week-digital-media-lounge/)
(Source: https://mashable.com/2010/08/31/announcing-the-un-week-digital-media-lounge/)
- Bringing together in one venue the influential people behind traditional and new media.
- Presenting rare opportunities to view presentations and meet face-to-face with key leaders on important global issues.
- Providing unique content and discussions held outside of the UN.
- Broadcasting major MDG Summit/UN Week presentations directly to 92Y.
- Raising awareness of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).
- Discovering and encouraging solutions for the MDGs by engaging with online communities.
- Showcasing solutions and innovative approaches.
Hans Rosling: The good news of the decade? | Video on TED.com
At the 2000 UN Millennium Summit, world leaders from rich and poor countries alike committed themselves - at the highest political level - to a set of eight time-bound targets that, when achieved, will end extreme poverty worldwide by 2015. Read more at https://www.endpoverty2015.org/?s=2010_mdg_review_summit&submit.x=33&submit.y=15&lang=en
At a critical UN Summit to review efforts to tackle world poverty, international charity WaterAid let loose a giant poo on the streets of New York to highlight a global sanitation crisis responsible for 4000 child deaths every day.
Diarrhoeal diseases caused by poor sanitation and unsafe water kill more children than AIDS, malaria and measles combined, while in Africa diarrhoea is now the biggest killer of children under five. Some 2.6 billion people across the globe live with no access to a safe clean toilet.
WaterAid’s Kate Norgrove said: “A giant poo at large on the streets of New York may seem like an odd way to get a serious message across but sanitation is still such a taboo subject that getting world leaders to address the issue calls for drastic measures.”
To coincide with the summit, WaterAid has also published a damning new report – Ignored: Biggest Child Killer – The world is neglecting sanitation - containing hard-hitting testimonies from global health experts and people across the developing world whose health and education are in jeopardy because of poor sanitation.
At current rates of progress, the 2015 sanitation Millennium Development Goal target to halve the proportion of people living without sanitation will not be met globally until 2049; in Sub-Saharan Africa not until the 23rd century, some 200 years late.
Norgrove continued: “If sanitation continues to be ignored, this will have huge consequences for the health of the world’s poorest people. Governments have a moral duty to deliver on the Millennium promises they made to ‘free the entire human race from want’. This simply won’t happen if one of the main underlying causes of child mortality is overlooked.”
Monday Sept. 20th 2010 was a summit presented by Mashable and 92Y discussing effective ways in which new media can help address the world’s challenges - when Susan Smith Ellis of RED spoke of how Social Media could help spread the message that an HIV + person needs 2 pills costing just 40 cents to remain alive, my thoughts went out to some one I know who needs to make sure that the HIV levels DO NOT fall below a certain level so that she could keep getting the medicine at a low cost fom the Govenment hospitals!! So I wonder how are we going to tackle such problems...Ray Chambers' (Special Envoy for Malaria, UN) solution of the $10 mosquito nets was something most of the Asian countries need - the tropical zone has this huge problem and I remember going to a village in Orissa (India) where every house had one person sick with malaria... read more at http://mashable.com/un-week/social-good-summit/
Stand up Take Action Against Poverty:
A day before the major UN summit, activists came from all over to rally in NYC at the Lincoln Center Josie Robertson Plaza Sunday on September 19, Noon to 4pm. Volunteers from 'Save the Children', 'The Hunger Project', Action Aid', and many others were there to educate, inspire and motivate all visitors. There was music and colour and speakers who spoke with passion and conviction - read more at http://www.standupnyc.org/ and join the cause. I think the most inspiring talk was by Ngozi N. Okonjo-Iweala, Managing Director, The World Bank.
Conference Day 1, Sept 21:
The world's biggest challenges no longer belong to a small set of voices; today Internet based Social Media tools ensured that it is a global conversation.
Today's discussions were centered around the prevention of TB, mainly lack of access to adequate drugs and stigmas that exist with regards to TB. And while HIV/AIDS and Malaria were considered dangeous, we fail to notice that most HIV+ people die by contacting TB. Reichman noted that TB is an "un-sexy" disease, and Craig David pointed out that the stigma attached to TB made it more difficult to increase community awareness and the effective implementation of programs when people are unwilling to identify themselves as having TB. While the discussions were mainly about TB in Africa, it must be noted that Asia has huge number of people who are suffering from drug - resistant strain of TB; indiscriminate dispensing of antibiotics is partly responsible for this. As rightly noted by Craig David, if you do not take the full course of antibiotics for the throat infection, you could end up with a strain of drug-resistant TB.
The next sesion focused on ICTs - Use of ICTs for Social good; trying to bring those technologies that work and are sustainable is the real challenge. The high proliferation of cell phones in India is a shining example.Cell phones have enpowered people - the service is so affordable that the poor can afford it, it helps then in their businesses - from the vegetable vendor to the plumber, or even a mason, young women who work as house maids - all have cell phones. Communication technology has changed the face of the country..
Read more about today's events at http://mashable.com/un-week/digital-media-lounge/
Conference Day 2, Sept 22:
Today's highlight was the unveiling of the UN's "Global Strategy for Women and Children's Health" by the UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. "Every Women, Every Child - was the commitment made with and estimated USD 40 billion in funding commited over the next 5 years. But this has to be delivered by governments and today we saw those countries, including India, Bangladesh and many African countries promising to deliver.
Watch this and much more at http://mashable.com/2010/09/21/live-watch-the-un-digital-media-lounge-video/
Global Campaign for Education 2010:
The global financial crisis has forced poor countries to cut their education budgets by $4.6 billion a year at a time when intensified efforts are needed to achieve the U.N. Millennium Development Goal of ensuring a primary school education for every child in the world by 2015, it said.
The report was produced by Education International, Plan International, Oxfam, Save the Children and VSO.
"Education is now on the brink," Kailash Satyarthi, president of the Global Campaign for Education which issued the report, told a high-level event in New York on the sidelines of a U.N. summit to promote achievement of the goal. Read more at http://www.campaignforeducation.org/ and http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hJ8k1oFDuzFlN6M2UDGT0n3mBLigD9IBTG0O1
I had met Kailash Satyarthi about 20 years back - he was fighting for the rights of children in the Carpet weaving industry and did manage to bring about some positive changes and get legislations passed so that children could not be employed in this industry - on the whole a very inspiring morning.
MDG Report 2010 Progress Chart:
Just so that we all appreciate the mammoth task we face take a look at this, The red boxes indicate "no progress or deterioration" http://mdgs.un.org/unsd/mdg/Resources/Static/Products/Progress2010/MDG_Report_2010_Progress_Chart_En.pdf
The Reality of Indian Health Care:
http://healthopine.com/the-reality-of-indian-health-care-queues-quacks-and-chaos/
Everyone has a Role: The Millennium Development Goals:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RwuK6CfXbaU
The Global Economic Crisis and Developing Countries | Oxfam International #OXFAM :
https://www.oxfam.org/en/research/global-economic-crisis-and-developing-countries
The importance of India to the achievement of the global MDGs #UNICEF :
There are two prominent trends in India: impressive economic growth and wealth creation; and stagnation in key social indicators, particularly among disadvantaged populations (i.e. geographically, by caste, gender). Read more here.. http://www.unicef.org/india/overview_3696.htm
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