“I don’t want your spare coins. I want change.”
– Melbourne graffiti.
Mad World Statistics
Who wants to compile them, let alone digest their brutal shapes? We’re awash in all kinds of cruel numbers : the species disappearing daily, the football fields of forests getting razed, the masses of people starving, suffering preventable disease, the enormous military budgets that could be spent elsewhere. And sure, these facts can be amassed and distributed in the hope that an informed population will help bring about change for a particular issue, but that’s a dirty job, examining and detailing our big, sloppy footprints.
And in the end, even with the information, people mightn’t necessarily feel empowered to make any difference about an ever growing list of societal and environmental problems. Jessica Williams is an optimist however, believing that an aware public will choose the more responsible paths available to them, and so she used her journalist and BBC television producer skills to compile a book of key facts, each supported by a mini-essay, lots of references, resources. To her immense credit, ’50 Facts That Should Change The World’ doesn’t come across as a nightmarish depressant, but invigorates a sense of unfairness, and a sense of possibility for change. These ‘facts’ are malleable, susceptible to change over time. The facts chosen are often counterintuitively provoking, something discovered as early as flipping through to:
Fact 2 : “A third of the world’s obese people live in the developing world.”
Not only does the developing world suffer such high levels of malnutrition, but large portions suffer obesity thanks to a shift from diverse traditional foods to monocultured farms, cheap imported junk foods, and lifestyle changes. Admittedly, the essay supporting this fact, and outlining some of the trade practices which sustain this trend, didn’t offer as much tangible actions or ideas as the essays for other facts.
Fact 8. “Every cow in the European Union is subsidised by $2.50 a day. That’s more than what 75 per cent of Africans have to live on.”
Globalisation is inevitable, is happening, and much of it can be good, but many trade subsidies in wealthier countries are hammering poorer nations.
Fact 27. “Every day, one in five of the world’s population – some 800 million people go hungry.”
We are actually making enough food daily for all of us to eat, but massive inequalities with the distribution of wealth mean that a significant portion of the people alive on the planet today go to sleep hungry each night. We are all dimly aware of this on some level, but another lucid 4 page summary of its scale and impact is perhaps a good motivator to do something about it.
Fact 32. “More than 70 per cent of the world’s population have never heard a dial tone.”
This was the case in 2004, and a useful reminder of the digital divide for those who complain when their broadband drops speed. Mobile phone technology seems to be leapfrogging over traditional phone lines however, and it seems that much of the developing world is rapidly embracing these possibilities, with the number of mobile users worldwide expected to reach 2 billion within a few years, that being one in every 3 people.
Fact 33. “A quarter of the world’s armed conflicts of recent years have involved a struggle for natural resources.”
Humans like to draw maps, and draw lines in maps. Natural phenomena like rivers don’t tend to care much for these though, and when they go across several borders and someone upstream is either polluting or steering the river elsewhere, trouble follows.
Fact 34. “Some 30 million people in Africa are HIV positive.”
That’s every single person in Australia, and quite a few million more. Intense. Epic. Tragic. And more, all in 4 pages.
Fact 43. “In 2003, the US spent $396 billion on its military. This is 33 times the combined military spending of the seven ‘rogue states’.
The US also spends more on the military than the next 20 highest national spenders combined. Uhuh.
Fact 48. “A kiwi fruit flown from New Zealand to Britain emits five times its own weight in greenhouse gases.”
We’ve grown accustomed to seeing supermarket shelves filled with all manner of foods all year round. Never mind that particular foods aren’t in season, or that the cheese came from France and the biscuits from Japan. Extravagant banana prices in Australia recently, due to crop damages, are perhaps a reminder that perhaps we should be more considerate of how seasonal the food we eat it, and how far it has had to travel.
Fact 49. “The US owes the United Nations more than $1 billion in unpaid dues.”
Guess who is the worst International citizen when it comes to supporting the United Nations? Mind you, this is chump change compared to their overall debt. As of September 21, 2006, the total U.S. government debt was $8.500 trillion. ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._public_debt )
Sample Resources
Oxfam – UK based development campaigning group
Human Rights Watch
World Watch Institute Much good reading.
Slow Food movement
World hunger, its causes and effects, what is being done.
Global Fund– to fight AIDS, Tuberclosis & Malaria
Save The Children – international perspective on child poverty
50 Facts That Should Change The World by Jessica Williams is distributed in Aus via allenandunwin.com, $19.95.