Who's got gas?

“Governments spend as much as $300 billion a year total in subsidies that encourage consumption and discourage efficiency. The subsidies delay the transition from dirty energy to more climate-friendly sources of power”, said a United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) Report.  

These subsides are hindering proactive fuel-efficient long term sustainability efforts.  Studies, such as those of the UNEP indicate that elimination of these subsidies would result in a 6% reduction in green-house gas emissions.

“The subsidies delay the transition from dirty energy to more climate-friendly sources of power,” said one UNEP report.  Kaveh Zahedi, UNEP’s climate change coordinator further stated that subsidies "don't always help the poor who need it most." They often benefit the wealthy.  He also said, “Some countries spend more on subsidizing oil than they do on health and education combined."  For villages that are not privy to electricity, where poor families consume only modest amounts of fuel, low electricity prices are meaningless. 

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Are there Universal Human Rights?

Identifying the fundamentals of human rights is complex and controversial.  For the most part, scholars such as Shashi Tharoor with the United Nations, agree that the basic necessities to sustain life that is ‘free from want’, such as food and shelter are critical to the human rights debate.  Others, like Francis Fukuyama argue that these rights are limited to civil, religious, and political rights granting freedom that implies more of an independent nature of survival.    Regardless of their differences and intricacies of perspective, there is a universal accepted acknowledgement that humans, as individuals, are entitled to ‘human rights protection.’

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), which was adopted in 1948 by the United Nations, acknowledged “traditional rights and freedoms, as well as new economic, social, and cultural liberties.”  Although the intent of the UDHR was globally accepted, the application of human rights protection in the developing world was and remains controversial.

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You want to play GOD?

Well, guess what – you do every day.

30,000 of our children die each day of hunger related issues that you and I could have prevented.

Every 3 seconds a child dies.......and it could have been prevented.  What would you do if this were your child?

How many will die just in the time it takes to read this article?  Here’s a test:  Read this article and time yourself.

From the micro to macro level the death tolls are approximately 200,000 each week, 800,000 each month, and a whopping 10+ million every year.   Additionally, 3.5 million people die annually from malnutrition, and another 1.02 billion people are chronically deprived of food = more than the population of USA, Canada, and European Union combined according to statistics presented by the FAO, the WHO, and UNICEF.

 Are you responsible?  Yes.  Every minute that passes that you choose to not take action, then consequentially you are deciding the fate of these children.  It’s time to be accountable.

Their life is in your hands and the ultimate question is:   

Will they live or will they die?

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